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According to a recent survey of local authorities, English councils are planning to sell community centers, athletic facilities, and retail spaces as they bet on a fire sale of assets to balance the books.

Increasing Financial Challenges Prompt Asset Sales

The Key Cities Group for second-tier cities in England reported that 60% of councils are planning to sell assets to meet the rising costs of adult and children’s social care.

Councils have previously come under fire for disposing of public land and open spaces to support their finances, but they contend they must proceed to generate essential revenue from property disposals or face insolvency.

The group said that a high proportion of councils seeking to raise money from a fire sale of assets represented “a clear change from 2024, when the majority (six in ten) of local leaders stated they would prioritise service redesigns and utilising savings to manage increasing financial challenges.”

Specific Examples of Proposed Disposals

Medway Council in Kent said its property management strategy featured the sale of a retail complex in a local town and a community venue in another town to generate £20m over the next half-decade.

• A local golf course and commercial properties owned in two English counties, which all generate rent for Medway council, will additionally be sold under the plan.

Council Tax Increases and Wider Financial Pressures

This research of local authorities in the coalition, which includes several urban centers, further found that more than 70% of authorities will need to raise local levies next spring to address the growing cost of core provisions, higher levels of homelessness, and a persistent accommodation deficit.

The authority said it will press ahead with asset sales after sharp increases in the cost of children services, support for vulnerable learners, elderly and disability services, and short-term housing.

“We are taking innovative approaches but certain measures take time to achieve both better provisions and cost efficiency,” said Vince Maple.

He continued: “We face demographic pressures which will continue to add to the strains we have. As a unitary authority, we had a 91% cut in our revenue support grant from over the past decade, which is very challenging.”

Countrywide Patterns and Forecasts

A survey of county councils this week further found local finances being stretched by the increasing figures of children and older individuals requiring Send support.

A network of councils said that local shortfalls will reach 4.4 billion pounds a year by 2029, as they grapple to manage increased demand.

Ministers have delayed planned reforms to the Send system until the coming year after a white paper setting out those changes was recently delayed.

Deprivation and Funding Shortfalls

Based on the latest indices of deprivation (IMD) covering English councils, several key cities members were among the most disadvantaged in the country.

• “Participating urban centers like several major towns rank in the most deprived 30 across the country under the latest IMD measures,” said the study.

“Although only one key city is among the ten most deprived for disadvantaged communities countrywide, cities are much more prone to be in the worst-off 20% of the nation. The figures highlights the extent of challenges facing municipal officials across major urban centers in the next twelve months,” the report added.

“Local government leaders have been clear about the necessity for a equitable and lasting financial structure that accounts for and addresses the real levels of deprivation and demand,” stated a council leader.

“Lacking this, local authorities will continue to face impossible choices around which vital provisions to fund, and which to cut, to the detriment of their communities.”

A fifth of local authorities have reduced or weakened care services in the last year, the study revealed.