Based on a new poll of municipal councils, English councils are planning to offload social clubs, athletic facilities, and shopping arcades as they bet on a fire sale of properties to stabilize finances.
Growing Financial Challenges Prompt Asset Sales
A coalition of councils representing major urban areas in the UK reported that 60% of local authorities are intending to sell assets to meet the escalating costs of social services for vulnerable individuals.
Councils have in the past come under fire for selling playing fields and open spaces to support their finances, but they contend they must continue 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 represented “a distinct shift from 2024, when the majority (six in ten) of local leaders stated they would prioritise service redesigns and using savings to weather increasing fiscal pressures.”
Detailed Examples of Planned Disposals
Medway Council in southeast England announced its asset disposal plan included the sale of a shopping centre in a local town and a community venue in another town to generate 20 million pounds over the next half-decade.
- Gillingham golf club and business parks owned in Worcestershire and Suffolk, which all generate rent for the authority, will also be disposed of under the plan.
Council Tax Increases and Wider Financial Pressures
This research of councils in the coalition, which includes several urban centers, further found that more than 70% of authorities will have to increase local levies next April to cover the rising cost of core provisions, higher levels of homelessness, and a longstanding housing shortage.
The authority explained it will proceed with property disposals after steep rises in the cost of youth support, support for vulnerable learners, adult social care, and short-term housing.
“We are adopting innovative approaches but certain measures require time to achieve both improved services and financial savings,” said a council leader.
He added: “We face demographic pressures which will persist to increase 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 Projections
A survey of county councils this week also found local finances being strained by the growing number of children and older individuals needing Send support.
A network of councils said that local shortfalls will hit 4.4 billion pounds a year by the end of the decade, as they grapple to manage rising needs.
Government officials have delayed planned reforms to the Send system until next year after a policy document setting out those reforms has been postponed.
Disadvantage and Financial Shortfalls
According to the latest indices of deprivation (IMD) covering UK local authorities, many key cities members 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 IMD measures,” noted the report.
“While only one key city is in the top 10 for deprived neighbourhoods nationally, cities are far more likely to be in the most deprived fifth of the nation. The figures highlights the extent of challenges facing municipal officials across major urban centers in the coming year,” the report concluded.
“Local government leaders have been explicit about the necessity for a equitable and lasting financial structure that accounts for and addresses the real levels of disadvantage and need,” said Michael Mordey.
“Lacking this, local authorities will persist to face impossible choices around which vital provisions to allocate spend to, and which to cut, to the detriment of their communities.”
One in five of councils have reduced or weakened social care provision in the last year, the survey found.
