Based on a new survey of municipal councils, UK councils are planning to sell social clubs, athletic facilities, and retail spaces as they rely on a fire sale of assets to balance the books.
Increasing Financial Pressures Drive Asset Sales
The Key Cities Group representing major urban areas in England reported that six out of ten of councils are intending to sell assets to meet the escalating costs of adult and children’s social care.
Local governments have previously come under fire for selling public land and land to shore up their finances, but they argue they must continue to raise vital cash from property disposals or face insolvency.
The group said that a high proportion of councils attempting to generate funds from a quick sale of holdings marked “a clear change from 2024, when the majority (six in ten) of local leaders stated they would focus on restructuring services and using financial reserves to weather growing fiscal pressures.”
Specific Cases of Planned Disposals
Medway Council in Kent announced its property management strategy included the disposal of a shopping centre in a local town and a social club in another town to generate £20m over the next half-decade.
- Gillingham golf club and commercial properties owned in two English counties, which all generate rent for the authority, will also be disposed of under the plan.
Council Tax Rises and Wider Fiscal Pressures
The survey of local authorities in the coalition, which includes several urban centers, further found that over seven in ten 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 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 take time to deliver both better provisions and financial savings,” stated a council leader.
He added: “There are population challenges which will continue to increase the pressures we have. As a local government body, we had a drastic reduction in our revenue support grant from 2010-24, which is extremely difficult.”
Countrywide Trends and Projections
A survey of regional authorities this week further found local finances being stretched by the increasing figures of young people and older individuals requiring Send support.
A network of councils said that council deficits will reach 4.4 billion pounds a year by the end of the decade, as they struggle to manage increased demand.
Ministers have delayed scheduled changes to the special educational needs framework until next year after a policy document setting out those reforms was recently delayed.
Deprivation and Financial Shortfalls
According to the latest indices of deprivation (the Index of Multiple Deprivation) covering UK local authorities, several participating urban areas were included in the most deprived in the country.
- “Participating urban centers like Hull, Bradford, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Wolverhampton place in the most deprived 30 nationally under the 2025 deprivation indices,” noted the study.
“Although only a single urban area is in the top 10 for deprived neighbourhoods nationally, cities are far more likely to be in the worst-off 20% of the nation. The figures underscores the scale of challenges confronting local leaders across major urban centers in the coming year,” the report concluded.
“Local government leaders have been explicit about the need for a equitable and lasting funding system that accounts for and responds to the real levels of disadvantage and demand,” said Michael Mordey.
“Without this, local authorities will continue to face difficult decisions around which essential services to allocate spend to, and which to cut, to the disadvantage of their communities.”
A fifth of local authorities have cut or compromised care services in the last year, the study found.
