Local Government Finance Settlement

Lord Bishop of Portsmouth Excerpts

Thursday 22nd January 2015 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Portsmouth]

My Lords, I welcome this debate on the implications and challenges of the local government settlement. On these Benches, and indeed in the whole House, we look forward to the maiden speeches of the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, and of my colleague and friend, the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Southwark. I look forward to that for many reasons, not least that he was a senior curate in the diocese that I now serve. He is the most recent in this House of a long line of able clergy nurtured and grown in the Diocese of Portsmouth.

I will focus on local welfare provision, which is a vital service to people in crisis, many of whom are very vulnerable. A single mother in Portsmouth, escaping domestic violence, lived for a while in overcrowded conditions with her mother. She successfully applied for her own accommodation but it was unfurnished, so she and her children shared a sofa-bed and lived on sandwiches and takeaways. The local council, through the Government’s allocation for local welfare provision, awarded her money for beds, a cooker and a fridge freezer. That sort of situation is repeated many times in my see city of Portsmouth and in other places. A modest award of a few hundred pounds provides the essentials for the decent nourishment and reasonable comfort of a mother and children.

I want to place on record my relief that the settlement announced in mid-December includes notional provision for the continuation of local welfare provision. I express both relief and gratitude but there are two caveats—two disappointments. First, the allocated amount of £129.6 million is substantially lower than in the past two settlements. Secondly, there is no obligation on councils to use the funding for that purpose; even the reduced allocation is not ring-fenced. It is possible to make a strong case for every item of local authority expenditure. However, this emergency local welfare provision surely should be an exceptional case. First, this is emergency help to very vulnerable people in crisis situations. Secondly, we are all aware that the tightening impact of welfare reform on mainstream benefits has increased the need for, and importance of, an effective safety net. Thirdly, the heavily reduced allocations for local welfare provision since 2010-11 means that in my city of Portsmouth, for instance, the amount spent since then has declined from £900,000 to £440,000, just over half. My anxiety is less about that particular decline and more about the considerable variation in local authority practice around the country.

Only ring-fenced allocations will commit the welcome, although reduced, resources to guarantee this crisis provision continuing. A relatively small amount of non-discretionary funding would not significantly restrict the local government autonomy which many of us seek to preserve. Alongside the moral case is an economic rationale. Portsmouth City Council’s review of the provision concluded that this modest expenditure saved substantial costs elsewhere. The loss of the provision increases demand for mental health services, for children’s social care, for temporary accommodation provision and debt advice. Preventing a tenancy breakdown, for instance, saves the authority nearly £7,000 per eviction.

On moral, economic and practical grounds, I make a modest request about a small but significant matter in this settlement and invite the Government, if they cannot maintain the level of local welfare allocation, at least to ring-fence it and ensure that those in crisis need are helped.