Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what recent assessment he has made of the state of local government finance (a) nationally and (b) in York.

In this year's Settlement, the Government made available an increase in Core Spending Power in England from £49 billion in 2020-21 to up to £51.3 billion in 2021-22, a 4.6% increase in cash terms. This saw City of York Council's Core Spending Power increase to over £140 million in 2021-22, an increase of 5%.

The Government also allocated more than £12 billion directly to councils since the start of the pandemic, with more than £6 billion of this un-ringfenced, recognising the value and need for an increase in local leading. City of York Council received £12.8 million in additional unringfenced Covid funding in 2020-21 and a further £4.4 million in 2021-22, a total of £17.2 million.

The Government will set out the future plan for local government funding at the 2021 Spending Review, which will be an opportunity to look at local government funding in the round. Following this DLUHC will provide further details of the proposed allocation of resources to each local authority through the provisional Local Government Finance Settlement.