Councils will get an extra £1.6billion in funding amid coronavirus
Parks MUST stay open, funerals can go ahead with close family and cemeteries will also stay open, says Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick as he pledges an extra £1.6billion to plug councils funding gap
- Situation could cause some councils to ‘take extreme cost-cutting and rationing’
- Crisis has raised the pressure on services like support for those with disabilities
- Local Government Secretary Robert Jenrick says extra money will boost councils
- Extra cash takes financial support to cope with the pandemic up to £3.2billion
- Learn more about how to help people impacted by COVID
Councils across England will be given an extra £1.6billion in funding to deal with the coronavirus after complaints from local authorities that services could suffer.
The Local Government Association has said the situation during the pandemic could cause some councils to ‘take extreme cost-cutting and rationing measures soon’.
The crisis has raised pressure on council services like support for those living with disabilities and social care, while income from areas like parking fees has dropped.
Local Government Secretary Robert Jenrick speaks at 10 Downing Street this afternoon
Local Government Secretary Robert Jenrick said the extra money will boost the backing councils have received to cope with the pandemic to £3.2billion.
An extra £300million will go to devolved administrations, with Scotland getting £155million, Wales £95million, and Northern Ireland £50million.
Mr Jenrick said: ‘I promised local government would have the resources they need to meet this challenge.
‘We stand shoulder to shoulder with local government and my priority is to make sure they are supported so they can continue to support their communities through this challenging time.
Mr Jenrick appears with NHS England national medical director Professor Stephen Powis during the daily Downing Street press conference today
‘Up and down the country council workers are the unsung heroes as we tackle this virus. They are in the front line of the national effort to keep the public safe and deliver the services people need.’
In a letter to Mr Jenrick before the extra funding was announced, the LGA said ‘radical action’ to prevent councils ‘rationing spending’ was needed
The organisation said that unless more funding was received, the situation would end up ‘harming both the long-term continuity of existing services and the Covid-19 response at a time when both are so vitally needed, something we all wish to avoid’.
The letter also stressed the loss of income being generated by councils.
Richard Watts, the leader of Islington Council in North London, told BBC News today (pictured) that councils are ‘going to have to start taking some pretty quick decisions if we don’t get the support we think we need’
It said: ‘Local authorities are suffering severe income loss from a range of services from leisure, parking, bus operations, planning and commercial waste.
‘Many councils rely heavily on this income to fund their annual expenditure – on average, 10 per cent of total gross service costs are funded through fees and charges, going up to 25 per cent on average for shire districts in particular.’
Richard Watts, the leader of Islington Council in North London, told BBC News today: ‘We are faced with this double whammy of spending money that we in normal circumstances wouldn’t have to spend on things like adult social care, as in the homeless, providing food and support for residents who are personally in financial crisis, at the same time as losing money hand over fist because of a loss of income from parking charges, of rents where we rent out our own buildings, people aren’t using leisure centres for obvious reasons.
‘So councils who are already struggling financially given ten years of pretty hard spending cuts imposed on us over the last decade are really teetering on the edge without further backing.’
He added: ‘We’re going to have to start taking some pretty quick decisions if we don’t get the support we think we need. We need to hear that the Government is going to carry on standing by local government.
‘At the rate we’re going we are probably going to need a similar size further tranche of money at some point down the line because it’s a really challenging situation for us.’
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