Provisional Local Government Finance Settlement

Steve McCabe Excerpts

Thursday 17th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Robert Jenrick]

Earlier in the year, I laid a written ministerial statement that set out the Government’s position with respect to local government reorganisation. It remains my view that, where there is local support, councils should consider further reorganisation to drive the sorts of efficiencies my hon. Friend speaks of, but there must be support for that within the local community. It is not the Government’s intention to impose that on parts of the country where it does not work for the character and nature of local government. We have taken forward three propositions—one in Cumbria, one in Somerset and one in North Yorkshire. Bids for those have been submitted to me, and my hon. Friend the Minister for Regional Growth and Local Government and I will be making decisions on that early in the new year.

[Steve McCabe (Birmingham, Selly Oak) (Lab)]

Public health teams have been a key part of the response to the covid crisis, but the King’s Fund reports that the public health grant settlement last year was 22% lower per head than it was for 2015-16. How does the Secretary of State plan to address that?

[Robert Jenrick]

We have provided exceptional resources both to the NHS and to local authorities over the course of the year, so the suggestion that public health has not been resourced this year is not correct. We have been providing huge sums of money to support the increasingly important role of directors of public health in local councils and the teams that are around them. With respect to Birmingham, we have provided £177 million of covid-19 expenditure funding already, much of which will have gone to support the sort of work that the hon. Gentleman is talking about, including through the infection control programmes.