Stuart Hoddinott

Yep - and low level anti-social behaviour, fly tipping, street crime and so on persist and in some places ramp up. Completely agree that neighbourhood-level problems are a big driver of a more pervading sense of decline and dissatisfaction.

Agree and would add a lack of understanding about what level of govt does what- so often the things that pop up in MPs’ inboxes are things that are in the gift of the local council and not MPs! And equally, local councils are blamed for things that are the result of funding envelopes set centrally

I'm increasingly convinced this is a huge driver of dissatisfaction with govt

Council tax is one of the most visible taxes that people pay, it goes directly out of their bank account and they get a letter about it going up every year

Yet bin collection frequency falls and libraries close

On Kent's council tax rise:

In June, @matildamartin.bsky.social found that some councils won by Reform spent nearly 80% of their 23-24 budget on social care & homelessness

IfG @stuarthoddinott.bsky.social said Reform faces "the same brutal trade-offs" that other councils struggled w/ "for 15yrs"

Yep, London has a far lower proportion of adults aged 65+ which means a lot less pressure on London councils' budgets

The Fair Funding Review will be a huge financial shock to some London councils though, will lead to some very difficult financial choices over the next few years

So after promising to cut "wasteful spending" and council tax Reform has:
- Found no waste and instead plans to cut invest-to-save schemes
- Will now raise council tax by the full 5%
- Realised they don't control asylum spending

A staggering amount of failure in 5 months

Kent (now a Reform run council) is also doing this!

Not sure if other councils are doing this, but interesting that Lambeth is trying to increase residents' understanding of both *what* they actually spend money on and the really difficult budget choices in the next couple of years

People often claim it's a mistake to call far-right figures racist. But it's extremely telling how much they hate being called racist. Farage doesn't welcome it. He is afraid of it. And he has benefited from people's reticence about using it to describe his policies.

I agree! But that’s a symptom of how broken the system is. The solution to that can’t just be: we’re now going to decide in Westminster how every LA spends every £ of funding

True. Capped at 5% p.a. increases for social care authorities without winning a referendum

Fully agree with you about purpose. LAs are forced to spend more and more on social care. Which also explains why people feel frustrated, all extra council tax goes on services few people see

The Pride in Place strategy wants "communities" to choose how to spend money

But local politicians already respond to what voters want

I'd argue the below chart shows councillors chose to protect bin collections and fixing potholes over libraries because that's (broadly) what voters preferred

Completely agree. It would also help if central govt trusted local leaders to know what's best and deliver it

Source of funding is also true. I'd be in favour of much more fiscal devolution. But a much larger proportion of LA funding comes from CT now than it did in 2010. ~50% now compared to ~33% in 2010

Completely agree with you about trust. I also don't think HMT trusts MHCLG, btw and therefore requires lots of assurance

Agree on the community point. You could argue that LAs *have* responded to communities by protecting waste collection and road maintenance while cutting libraries spending

Meanwhile the govt does nothing to address the underlying reasons for the closures of community spaces i.e. serious underfunding of local authorities

The result is that we get another round of small, tightly ringfenced pots of money, with civil servants trying to control how local areas spend it

That will survive until the next minister comes along at which point they want their own announcement and the cycle starts again

3. there is no money to properly fund LAs. And even if there was, there is a risk LAs would spend it on e.g. more social care (which is also desperately needed)

4. politicians love announcing things. £5bn for high streets? Wow! That'll get a great write up. £5bn in LAs' budgets? Crickets

So why are Labour doing the same thing it criticised the last govt for?

1. ministers in Westminster have identified the same issues as the last govt and want to do something about them

2. LAs are not doing what central govt wants because they have no money (they also want to do these things btw)

But now we're back to this sort of nonsense

I'm sure public toilets are needed. But why put up more barriers to accessing funding?

And then there's this baffling array of funds worth tiny amounts of money. All designed with good intentions, but why not just increase LAs grant funding instead!

Then there's the way that funding is being allocated

The last govt used small funding pots with strict rules on how LAs spend money. That's a really bad way of allocating funding - you can't direct investment from Whitehall

This govt identified that as a problem and simplified funding in 2025/26

It's difficult to see that changing in this parliament. By 2028/29, LAs' per person spending power will still be ~15% lower in real terms than in 2010

So LAs will be forced to continue selling community assets to cover funding gaps, while central govt tries to "protect" those assets with this money

Funding pressures are so bad that the last govt began allowing LAs to sell assets like libraries and youth centres to meet in-year funding pressures

Labour carried that on for 25/26, meaning that LAs could sell up to £1.3bn worth of assets, almost 3x the annual funding from the new programme

The weirdest thing is that the strategy pinpoints things like the closure of libraries and the sale of community assets as a cause of decline

But there's no analysis of why that's happened

Local authorities (LAs) have closed libraries and youth centres because funding has been so tight since 2010

Pride in Place Strategy The Pride in Place Strategy will help build stronger communities, create thriving places and empower local people.

The govt published its strategy to revitalise local communities last week

There is a heavy focus on directing funding to high streets and community spaces, which is part of the reason for declining "pride in place"

But it seems misguided for a few reasons

Short thread

www.gov.uk/government/p...

In new @theifs.bsky.social work, we examine the fiscal challenge of the UK's commitment to higher defence spending. If met, for the first time in a long time health and defence spending would likely rise simultaneously (as a % of GDP). This would change the shape and/or size of the state.

They’re not on course to form the next gov. Today’s polling suggests they might win if there was an election today…

This type of language is utterly unacceptable. Two MPs have actually been murdered in the last decade. Using violent rhetoric like this isn't big or clever, it's dangerous and idiotic

This interview is so much worse than the headline lets on

Reform UK must ‘cut away’ at civil service, says Nigel Farage ally If the party wins the next election, it should scrap several regulators and watchdogs, Arron Banks says

Farage's soft underbelly exposed?

'Banks said if Reform won power it should introduce a “Big Reform Bill” to roll back current human rights laws as well as legislation underpinning corporate regulation, saying that when it came to regulators he wanted to “get rid of virtually everything”.'