According to a recent poll of local authorities, English councils are preparing to sell social clubs, sports centres, and shopping arcades as they bet on a rapid disposal of properties to stabilize finances.
Growing Fiscal Pressures Drive Asset Sales
The Key Cities Group for second-tier cities 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.
Councils have in the past faced criticism for disposing of public land and open spaces to support their finances, but they contend they must continue to generate essential revenue from property disposals or declare themselves bankrupt.
The group said that a high proportion of councils attempting to generate funds from a quick sale of holdings represented “a distinct shift from 2024, when the majority (six in ten) of municipal officials said they would prioritise restructuring services and using financial reserves to manage growing fiscal pressures.”
Specific Cases of Planned Disposals
Medway Council in Kent said its asset disposal plan featured the disposal of a retail complex in Rainham and a social club in another town to raise £20m over the next half-decade.
- A local golf course and commercial properties held in two English counties, which all generate rent for Medway council, will also be sold under the strategy.
Council Tax Increases and Wider Financial Strains
This research of councils in the key cities group, which includes Sunderland, Southampton, Gloucester and Salford, further found that over seven in ten of authorities will have to increase local levies next spring to address the growing cost of core provisions, higher levels of homelessness, and a longstanding housing shortage.
Medway council said it will proceed with asset sales after steep rises in the cost of youth support, special educational needs and disability (Send) provision, adult social care, and temporary accommodation.
“We are taking creative strategies but certain measures take time to achieve both improved services and cost efficiency,” stated a council leader.
He continued: “We face population challenges which will persist to increase the pressures we have. As a local government body, 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 recently also found council budgets being strained by the increasing figures of young people and older individuals needing Send support.
A network of councils said that council deficits will reach 4.4 billion pounds a year by the end of the decade, as they grapple to manage rising needs.
Ministers have put off scheduled changes to the special educational needs framework until the coming year after a white paper setting out those reforms was recently delayed.
Disadvantage and Funding Gaps
Based on the latest indices of deprivation (the Index of Multiple Deprivation) for UK local authorities, many key cities members were included in the most disadvantaged in England.
- “Participating urban centers like several major towns place in the most deprived 30 nationally under the 2025 IMD measures,” noted the study.
“While only a single urban area is in the top 10 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 facing municipal officials across key cities in the coming year,” the analysis added.
“Council officials have been clear about the necessity for a fair and sustainable funding system that accounts for and responds to the real levels of disadvantage and need,” said Michael Mordey.
“Without this, local authorities will continue to face impossible choices around which essential services to allocate spend to, and which to reduce, to the detriment of their communities.”
One in five of councils have cut or compromised care services in the past 12 months, the study revealed.
