Local Government Finance

Debate between Florence Eshalomi and Mark Garnier

Wednesday 11th February 2026 Commons Chamber

[Florence Eshalomi]

I thank the hon. Member, an excellent colleague on our cross-party Select Committee, for his intervention. The Committee looked at this in our report on local government finance, and he will remember that our report stated:

“Exceptional Financial Support (EFS) by means of capitalisation direction is a stopgap measure that avoids section 114 notices and allows councils to produce short-term balanced budgets, but can weaken councils’ finances and capital investment in the long term.”

There is an issue, and we cannot keep sweeping it under the carpet and thinking that it is going to go away—it is not. In the long term, we are building more debts for those councils, which we have to look at addressing. I am pleased that the Government are going to ensure that councils applying for ESF have a wholesale root-and-branch review of how that money is to be allocated.

We know that this multi-year funding process will not solve the underlying issues facing all our councils. Another area at the heart of this issue, which I have mentioned on many occasions and on which there is growing cross-party support, is the reliance on the most regressive form of taxation to pay for mandatory demand-led services, where councils have little control over that demand. Council tax amounts to about half of the settlement total, with an assumption of the maximum increase across the board, despite the fact that the Government have little control over how much that figure will be. The Secretary of State has highlighted that in boroughs where the referendum principle will be lifted, the Government are assuming that increasing council tax will help, with some councils having to increase their council tax by over 30% just to reach their core spending powers and the figures in the settlement.

I think we all understand the challenges the Government face when it comes to balancing the books and the inheritance they were left with after 14 years. These are difficult decisions that we have to make, but let me take us back to when the former Local Government Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton, told us:

“There is a real danger to the democratic process if there is not a link between the tax that people are paying and the quality of public services that they are getting in return.”—[Official Report, 5 February 2025; Vol. 761, c. 850.]

[Mark Garnier]

On exactly this point about the democratic process, my constituents were promised by the Reform candidates that they would cut council tax, but Worcestershire county council’s council tax is going up by 9%. It is a shame that not a single Reform Member of Parliament has turned up to defend what they have done. The worrying point is that we are being denied a referendum even though this goes above the 5% threshold. That bit of the democratic process has been removed from Worcestershire.

[Florence Eshalomi]

I agree. I think many residents are feeling the pinch. Yes, we have seen fantastic initiatives and new legislation from this Government, but that is not trickling down quickly enough. Many residents will be seeing their council tax bills in the next few months, and for a number of them, those bills will be going up. It is important that we look at that democratic link.