Based on a new survey of local authorities, English councils are planning to offload social clubs, athletic facilities, and retail spaces as they rely on a fire sale of assets to stabilize finances.
Growing Fiscal Challenges Prompt Asset Sales
The Key Cities Group for major urban areas in England reported that six out of ten of local authorities are intending to sell assets to cover the escalating costs of adult and children’s social care.
Local governments have previously come under fire for selling playing fields and land to shore up their finances, but they contend they must proceed to generate essential revenue from asset sales or face insolvency.
This coalition noted that a high proportion of authorities seeking to raise money from a fire sale of assets represented “a distinct shift from 2024, when the majority (six in ten) of local leaders stated they would prioritise restructuring services and utilising financial reserves to manage increasing financial challenges.”
Specific Cases of Planned Disposals
Medway Council in southeast England announced its asset disposal plan included the disposal of a retail complex in Rainham and a community venue in another town to raise £20m over the next half-decade.
- Gillingham golf club and business parks held in Worcestershire and Suffolk, which all provide rental income for Medway council, will also be sold under the plan.
Council Tax Rises and Wider Fiscal Pressures
This research of local authorities in the coalition, which includes Sunderland, Southampton, Gloucester and Salford, also found that more than 70% of councils will have to raise local levies next spring to address the growing cost of core provisions, higher levels of homelessness, and a longstanding housing shortage.
Medway council explained it will press ahead with asset sales after steep rises in the cost of youth support, support for vulnerable learners, adult social care, and temporary accommodation.
“We are adopting creative strategies but some of these take time to deliver both better provisions and financial savings,” stated a council leader.
He added: “We face population challenges which will persist to add to the pressures 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 Trends and Projections
Research of county councils this week further found local finances being stretched by the increasing figures of children and older individuals needing Send support.
A network of councils projected that council deficits will reach £4.4bn a year by 2029, as they struggle to cope with rising needs.
Government officials have delayed scheduled changes to the Send system until the coming year after a white paper setting out those reforms was recently delayed.
Disadvantage and Funding Shortfalls
Based on the most recent deprivation measures (IMD) covering English councils, many key cities members were among the most deprived in England.
- “Participating urban centers like Hull, Bradford, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Wolverhampton place in the most deprived 30 across the country under the 2025 IMD measures,” said the study.
“Although only one key city is among the ten most deprived for deprived neighbourhoods countrywide, urban areas are much more prone to be in the worst-off 20% of England. The data highlights the scale of challenges facing local leaders across key cities in the coming year,” the report concluded.
“Local government leaders have been explicit about the necessity for a equitable and lasting funding system that reflects and responds to the actual extent of disadvantage and demand,” said Michael Mordey.
“Lacking this, local authorities will persist to face impossible choices around which essential services to fund, and which to cut, to the disadvantage of their residents.”
A fifth of councils have reduced or weakened care services in the past 12 months, the study revealed.
