According to a new study of municipal councils, English councils are planning to offload social clubs, athletic facilities, and retail spaces as they bet on a rapid disposal of assets to stabilize finances.
Growing Financial Pressures Drive Asset Sales
The Key Cities Group for major urban areas in the UK stated that six out of ten of local authorities are intending to dispose of properties to cover the escalating costs of adult and children’s social care.
Local governments have previously faced criticism for disposing of public land and open spaces to shore up their finances, but they contend they must continue to generate essential revenue from property disposals or declare themselves bankrupt.
The group said that a significant number of councils seeking to generate funds from a fire sale of assets marked “a clear change from 2024, when the majority (60%) of municipal officials stated they would prioritise restructuring services and using financial reserves to manage increasing fiscal pressures.”
Specific Examples of Proposed Sales
One local authority in Kent said its property management strategy included the disposal of a retail complex in a local town and a community venue in another town to raise £20m over the next half-decade.
- Gillingham golf club and business parks owned in Worcestershire and Suffolk, which all generate rent for the authority, will additionally be disposed of under the strategy.
Council Tax Rises and Wider Fiscal Strains
The survey of councils in the coalition, which covers several urban centers, further found that more than 70% of councils will need to increase local levies next spring to cover the growing cost of essential services, increased rates of housing insecurity, and a longstanding accommodation deficit.
The authority said it will press ahead with property disposals after sharp increases in the cost of children services, special educational needs and disability (Send) provision, adult social care, and short-term housing.
“We are taking innovative approaches but certain measures take time to achieve both improved services and cost efficiency,” said a council leader.
He added: “We face demographic pressures which will continue to add to the pressures we have. As a unitary authority, we had a drastic reduction in our central funding from 2010-24, which is extremely difficult.”
National Trends and Forecasts
A survey of regional authorities recently further found council budgets being strained by the growing number of children and older individuals needing special educational assistance.
The County Councils Network said that council deficits will reach 4.4 billion pounds a year by the end of the decade, as they struggle to manage rising needs.
Ministers have delayed scheduled changes to the special educational needs framework until next year after a policy document setting out those changes has been postponed.
Disadvantage and Financial Gaps
Based on the latest deprivation measures (IMD) for UK local authorities, several participating urban areas were among the most disadvantaged in England.
- “Participating urban centers like several major towns rank in the most deprived 30 nationally under the 2025 deprivation indices,” noted the report.
“Although only a single urban area is in the ten most deprived for deprived neighbourhoods countrywide, cities are much more prone to be in the most deprived fifth of England. The data highlights the scale of difficulties confronting local leaders across key cities in the coming year,” the report added.
“Local government leaders have been explicit about the need for a equitable and lasting funding system that reflects and responds to the real levels of deprivation and need,” said a council leader.
“Lacking this, councils will continue to face impossible choices around which vital provisions to allocate spend to, and which to cut, to the disadvantage of their communities.”
A fifth of local authorities have cut or compromised social care provision in the past 12 months, the study revealed.
