Based on a new poll of local authorities, UK councils are preparing to offload social clubs, sports centres, and shopping arcades as they rely on a fire sale of properties to stabilize finances.
Growing Fiscal Challenges Prompt Asset Sales
A coalition of councils representing major urban areas in the UK reported that 60% of councils are intending to dispose of properties to meet the rising costs of adult and children’s social care.
Councils have in the past come under fire for selling public land and open spaces to shore up their budgets, but they contend they must continue to raise vital cash from property disposals or face insolvency.
The group noted that a significant number of councils attempting to generate funds from a quick sale of assets represented “a clear change from 2024, when the largest share (six in ten) of municipal officials said they would prioritise restructuring services and using savings to manage increasing financial challenges.”
Specific Examples of Proposed Sales
Medway Council in Kent said its asset disposal plan featured 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 commercial properties owned in Worcestershire and Suffolk, which all provide rental income for the authority, will also be disposed of under the plan.
Local Levy Increases and Broader Financial Strains
The survey of councils in the coalition, which includes Sunderland, Southampton, Gloucester and Salford, further found that more than 70% of councils will have to raise local levies next April to cover the growing cost of essential services, increased rates of homelessness, and a persistent accommodation deficit.
The authority said it will press ahead with property disposals after steep rises in the cost of children services, special educational needs and disability (Send) provision, elderly and disability services, and short-term housing.
“We are taking innovative approaches but some of these require time to achieve both improved services and cost efficiency,” said Vince Maple.
He added: “We face demographic pressures which will continue to increase 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.”
National Trends and Forecasts
Research of regional authorities this week further found council budgets being strained by the growing number of children and older individuals needing special educational assistance.
A network of councils projected that local shortfalls will reach £4.4bn a year by 2029, as they struggle to manage increased demand.
Ministers have delayed planned reforms to the Send system until the coming year after a white paper setting out those changes has been postponed.
Deprivation and Funding Shortfalls
Based on the most recent deprivation measures (the Index of Multiple Deprivation) for English councils, many participating urban areas were included in the most deprived in England.
- “Member cities like Hull, Bradford, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Wolverhampton rank in the most deprived 30 nationally under the 2025 deprivation indices,” said the report.
“While only a single urban area is among the ten most deprived for disadvantaged communities nationally, cities are far more likely to be in the worst-off 20% of England. The figures highlights the extent of difficulties confronting municipal officials across major urban centers in the next twelve months,” the report concluded.
“Council officials have been explicit about the necessity for a equitable and lasting funding system that accounts for and addresses the real levels of disadvantage and need,” stated Michael Mordey.
“Lacking this, councils will persist to face difficult decisions around which essential services to allocate spend to, and which to reduce, to the disadvantage of their communities.”
A fifth of local authorities have reduced or weakened care services in the last year, the survey found.
