According to a new poll of local authorities, English councils are planning to sell social clubs, sports centres, and retail spaces as they rely on a fire sale of properties to stabilize finances.
Growing Fiscal Challenges Drive Asset Sales
The Key Cities Group for second-tier cities in the UK reported that 60% of councils are intending to dispose of properties to meet the escalating costs of adult and children’s social care.
Councils have previously come under fire for selling playing fields and open spaces to shore up their budgets, but they contend they must continue to raise vital cash from asset sales or face insolvency.
The group said that a high proportion of authorities seeking to generate funds from a fire sale of holdings represented “a distinct shift from 2024, when the largest share (60%) of local leaders said they would prioritise restructuring services and using savings to weather growing fiscal pressures.”
Detailed Examples of Planned Sales
One local authority in Kent announced its property management strategy featured the disposal of a shopping centre in a local town and a community venue in Rochester to raise 20 million pounds over the next half-decade.
- Gillingham golf club and business parks owned in two English counties, which all provide rental income for the authority, will additionally be sold under the plan.
Local Levy Rises and Wider Fiscal Strains
The survey of councils in the coalition, which includes several urban centers, further found that more than 70% of councils will need to raise council taxes next April to cover the rising cost of core provisions, higher levels of homelessness, and a longstanding accommodation deficit.
The authority said it will press ahead with property disposals after steep rises in the cost of youth support, special educational needs and disability (Send) provision, elderly and disability services, and temporary accommodation.
“We are taking innovative approaches but certain measures take time to deliver both improved services and financial savings,” stated a council leader.
He continued: “We face demographic pressures which will persist to increase the pressures we have. As a unitary authority, we had a 91% cut in our central funding from 2010-24, which is very challenging.”
National Patterns and Forecasts
Research of county councils recently further found council budgets being strained by the growing number of young people and older individuals needing Send support.
The County Councils Network projected that local shortfalls will hit £4.4bn a year by the end of the decade, as they grapple to cope with rising needs.
Government officials have delayed planned reforms to the Send system until the coming year after a policy document outlining those changes was recently delayed.
Disadvantage and Funding Gaps
Based on the latest indices of deprivation (IMD) covering English councils, several participating urban areas were among the most deprived in the country.
- “Member cities like Hull, Bradford, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Wolverhampton rank in the top 30 across the country under the 2025 IMD measures,” said the study.
“Although only a single urban area is among the ten most deprived for disadvantaged communities nationally, cities are much more prone to be in the most deprived fifth of the nation. The data highlights the scale of difficulties confronting local leaders across key cities in the coming year,” the report concluded.
“Local government leaders have been explicit about the need for a fair and sustainable funding system that accounts for and addresses the real levels of disadvantage and need,” stated Michael Mordey.
“Lacking this, local authorities will continue to face difficult decisions around which vital provisions to fund, and which to reduce, to the disadvantage of their communities.”
One in five of local authorities have reduced or weakened social care provision in the past 12 months, the study revealed.
