According to a new poll of municipal councils, UK councils are planning to offload social clubs, athletic facilities, and shopping arcades as they rely on a rapid disposal of assets to balance the books.
Increasing Financial Pressures Prompt Asset Sales
A coalition of councils for major urban areas in the UK stated that six out of ten of councils are intending to sell assets to meet the rising costs of adult and children’s social care.
Councils have in the past come under fire for disposing of public land 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 said that a high proportion of authorities seeking to raise money from a fire sale of holdings marked “a distinct shift from 2024, when the majority (six in ten) of local leaders said they would focus on service redesigns and using financial reserves to weather increasing financial challenges.”
Detailed Examples of Proposed Disposals
Medway Council in Kent said its property management strategy featured the disposal of a shopping centre in Rainham and a social club in another town to raise £20m over the next half-decade.
- Gillingham golf club and commercial properties owned in two English counties, which all provide rental income for Medway council, will additionally be sold under the strategy.
Council Tax Rises and Broader Financial Pressures
The survey of councils in the coalition, which covers Sunderland, Southampton, Gloucester and Salford, further found that over seven in ten of authorities will have to increase local levies next April to cover the growing cost of essential services, increased rates of housing insecurity, and a persistent accommodation deficit.
The authority said it will press ahead with asset sales after sharp increases in the cost of children services, support for vulnerable learners, elderly and disability services, and temporary accommodation.
“We are adopting innovative approaches but some of these require time to deliver both better provisions and financial savings,” said a council leader.
He added: “We face 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 extremely difficult.”
Countrywide Patterns and Projections
A survey of regional authorities recently further found council budgets being strained by the increasing figures of young people and adults needing Send support.
The County Councils Network projected that local shortfalls will hit 4.4 billion pounds a year by the end of the decade, as they grapple to cope with increased demand.
Government officials have put off planned reforms to the Send system until the coming year after a white paper outlining those changes was recently delayed.
Disadvantage and Funding Shortfalls
According to the latest indices of deprivation (the Index of Multiple Deprivation) covering English councils, several participating urban areas were included in the most disadvantaged in the country.
- “Participating urban centers like several major towns rank in the most deprived 30 across the country under the 2025 IMD measures,” noted the report.
“Although only one key city is in the top 10 for disadvantaged communities countrywide, urban areas are far more likely to be in the worst-off 20% of England. The figures underscores the extent of difficulties facing local leaders across key cities in the coming year,” the analysis concluded.
“Local government leaders have been explicit about the necessity for a fair and sustainable financial structure that accounts for and responds to the actual extent of disadvantage and need,” stated Michael Mordey.
“Without this, local authorities will persist to face impossible choices around which vital provisions to allocate spend to, and which to reduce, to the detriment of their communities.”
One in five of councils have cut or compromised social care provision in the last year, the study revealed.
