Greater Manchester’s Mayor Tony Lloyd has slammed the government’s austerity agenda for penalising the poor.
An Institute of Fiscal Studies report, published today, shows that changes to how local authorities are funded have disproportionately hit the most deprived areas of the country and he will raise the issue and the findings of the report with Greater Manchester leaders when they meet this Friday.
The report found that major changes to councils’ funding are making councils much more dependent on the amount of council tax and business rates raised locally.
Excluding education spending, councils in England plan to spend around 22% less on service provision in 2016–17 than they did in 2009–10.
Cuts in Scotland and Wales, at 15% and 11.5% respectively, have been smaller. This is partly because of the devolved governments’ decisions to protect health spending to a lesser extent than in England allowing smaller cuts to other areas. And in Wales’ case council tax bills have risen substantially more than in England.
In England, cuts have been much larger for poorer, more grant-dependent councils than their richer neighbours, who can raise more of the money they need via their own council tax revenues.
The mainly urban and poorer councils among the tenth which are most grant-reliant have had to cut their spending on services by 33% on average, compared to 9% for those richer councils among the tenth which are least grant-reliant.
Tony said:
“This report shows how the poorest in our society are still being left behind while the wealthy shires continue to prosper. This is unfair and unjust to the people of Greater Manchester, which has some of the most deprived communities in the UK.In Greater Manchester we have taken control of our own destiny, working more closely together, pooling resources and reshaping services. But we cannot ignore the fact that more than £1bn has been axed from local authority budgets – and we cannot ignore the impact on local people, particularly the most vulnerable in our communities.
“Greater Manchester leaders have relentlessly called on Government to give us a fair deal and safeguard our communities. I will be raising this issue at the GMCA meeting in Salford this Friday to ensure we continue to put pressure on Ministers.”
