The Review

Local government senior managers and councillors knew the Spending Review would be bad news for them – and so it has proved. In that sense, there are few surprises. Most plugged-in chief executives have been working on the assumption of about 30% cuts over the four-year cycle.
The actual figures announced this week by the chancellor envisage cuts of 28% in local government, with 30% in overall capital spending. The Communities and Local Government department’s ‘overall resource’ will drop by 51%.
Curiously, the CLG, announcing the 26% cut, notes that if taking council tax rises into account, the total real-term cut comes down to 14%, which suggests that council tax may not be quite so frozen in the future as ministers have suggested.
There are some chinks of light for local government, such as ending ring-fenced grants, giving them greater powers over benefits and, in particular, providing new funds to boost joint working with the NHS. Indeed, there have been suggestions that the only way the NHS will get through the next four years will be by reducing costs through more joint care and health provision. Equally, some health bodies have already expressed concern that the unring-fenced £1bn given to councils to boost more joint working with the NHS may well disappear to meet their other unm
Local government senior managers and councillors knew the Spending Review would be bad news for them – and so it has proved. In that sense, there are few surprises. Most plugged-in chief executives have been working on the assumption of about 30% cuts over the four-year cycle.
The actual figures announced this week by the chancellor envisage cuts of 28% in local government, with 30% in overall capital spending. The Communities and Local Government department’s ‘overall resource’ will drop by 51%.
Curiously, the CLG, announcing the 26% cut, notes that if taking council tax rises into account, the total real-term cut comes down to 14%, which suggests that council tax may not be quite so frozen in the future as ministers have suggested.
There are some chinks of light for local government, such as ending ring-fenced grants, giving them greater powers over benefits and, in particular, providing new funds to boost joint working with the NHS. Indeed, there have been suggestions that the only way the NHS will get through the next four years will be by reducing costs through more joint care and health provision. Equally, some health bodies have already expressed concern that the unring-fenced £1bn given to councils to boost more joint working with the NHS may well disappear to meet their other unmet needs, such as filling winter potholes.
And it is particularly good news that the offspring of Total Place, community-based budgeting, is back on course, with 16 pilots and a hint these could be rolled out. This initiative was unnecessarily delayed because of a change of government and 12 months – and a heap of efficiency savings – have been wasted.
But the real impact on communities will not be truly felt until the detail of the Spending Review has been applied to each council’s budget. In the meantime, anyone scrutinising the announcement would, as ever, be well advised to apply the three essential safety checks, namely, examine the small print, watch out for the law of unintended consequences, and keep an eye on the mischievous work of those favourite Treasury aides, Smoke and Mirrors.