Based on a latest poll of local authorities, English councils are planning to offload social clubs, sports centres, and retail spaces as they rely on a rapid disposal of properties to stabilize finances.
Growing Financial Challenges Prompt Asset Sales
The Key Cities Group representing major urban areas in the UK stated that 60% of local authorities are intending to sell assets to meet the rising costs of adult and children’s social care.
Local governments have previously faced criticism for selling public land and land to support their budgets, but they argue they must continue to raise vital cash from asset sales or declare themselves bankrupt.
The group said that a high proportion of councils seeking to raise money from a fire sale of holdings represented “a distinct shift from 2024, when the largest share (60%) of local leaders stated they would prioritise service redesigns and utilising financial reserves to weather growing financial challenges.”
Specific Examples of Planned Disposals
Medway Council in southeast England announced its asset disposal plan featured the disposal of a retail complex in a local town and a social club in another town to raise 20 million pounds over five years.
- Gillingham golf club and commercial properties held in Worcestershire and Suffolk, which all provide rental income for Medway council, will also be disposed of under the strategy.
Local Levy Increases and Broader Fiscal Strains
This research of local authorities in the key cities group, which includes Sunderland, Southampton, Gloucester and Salford, also found that over seven in ten of councils will need to increase council taxes next spring to cover the growing cost of core provisions, increased rates of housing insecurity, and a longstanding housing shortage.
Medway council explained it will press ahead with property disposals after sharp increases in the cost of children services, support for vulnerable learners, elderly and disability services, and temporary accommodation.
“We are taking creative strategies but some of these take time to achieve both improved services and financial savings,” said a council leader.
He continued: “There are population challenges which will persist to add to the strains we have. As a unitary authority, we had a 91% cut in our central funding from over the past decade, which is very challenging.”
Countrywide Patterns and Projections
A survey of regional authorities recently also found local finances being strained by the growing number of young people and adults needing Send support.
A network of councils projected that council deficits will hit £4.4bn a year by the end of the decade, as they struggle to cope with increased demand.
Ministers have put off planned reforms to the special educational needs framework until next year after a policy document outlining those changes was recently delayed.
Disadvantage and Funding Shortfalls
Based on the most recent indices of deprivation (IMD) covering English councils, several participating urban areas were among the most disadvantaged in the country.
- “Member cities like several major towns place in the most deprived 30 nationally under the 2025 deprivation indices,” said the report.
“While only one key city is in the ten most deprived for disadvantaged communities countrywide, urban areas are far more likely to be in the worst-off 20% of England. The data underscores the scale of challenges confronting municipal officials across key cities in the coming year,” the report concluded.
“Council officials have been clear about the necessity for a fair and sustainable financial structure that accounts for and responds to the actual extent of disadvantage and need,” stated a council leader.
“Lacking this, councils will persist to face impossible choices around which essential services to fund, and which to cut, to the disadvantage of their residents.”
One in five of local authorities have reduced or weakened care services in the past 12 months, the study revealed.
