Local Government Finance

(asked on 14th December 2018) - View Source

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

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the relationship between the delivery of statutory services by local authorities and the financial sustainability of local authorities.


This question was answered on 20th December 2018

As part of Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government’s (MHCLG) responsibility for the overall sustainability of the local government finance system, the Department assesses the total amount of funding available to local government to deliver statutory responsibilities. The Department assesses this both top-down, looking at a macro level to see how much funding is in the system as a whole when set against cost drivers, demographics and opportunities for efficiencies; and bottom-up looking at financial indicators, overall capacity, leadership and governance for individual authorities. The Department’s overall judgement also considers whether there is flexibility in the system to respond to events, emergencies and to be able to provide the broader local leadership expected by communities.

Each department is then responsible for establishing its own arrangements to ensure that services for which it has policy responsibility remain sustainable and that statutory responsibilities are being met. Local authorities are also independent of central Government, and are responsible for managing their financial budgets and for making spending decisions in line with their priority needs.

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