According to a recent study of local authorities, UK councils are preparing to offload community centers, sports centres, and retail spaces as they rely on a fire sale of properties to stabilize finances.
Growing Fiscal Pressures Drive Asset Sales
A coalition of councils for major urban areas in the UK stated that 60% of councils are planning to sell assets to cover the rising costs of adult and children’s social care.
Local governments have in the past come under fire for selling public land and open spaces to shore up their budgets, but they argue they must continue to raise vital cash from asset sales or face insolvency.
The group noted that a significant number of councils seeking to raise money from a quick sale of assets represented “a clear change from 2024, when the largest share (60%) of local leaders said they would prioritise restructuring services and using savings to weather increasing fiscal pressures.”
Specific Cases of Planned Sales
One local authority in southeast England announced its asset disposal plan featured the sale of a retail complex in a local town and a social club in Rochester to generate £20m over the next half-decade.
- Gillingham golf club and business parks owned in two English counties, which all generate rent for Medway council, will additionally be sold under the strategy.
Council Tax Rises and Broader Financial Pressures
This research of local authorities in the key cities group, which includes Sunderland, Southampton, Gloucester and Salford, further found that over seven in ten of councils will need to raise council taxes next spring to cover the growing cost of core provisions, higher levels of homelessness, and a persistent accommodation deficit.
Medway council said it will press ahead with property disposals after steep rises in the cost of youth support, support for vulnerable learners, elderly and disability services, and temporary accommodation.
“We are adopting creative strategies but some of these require time to deliver both better provisions and cost efficiency,” stated Vince Maple.
He added: “There are population challenges which will continue to increase the pressures we have. As a local government body, we had a drastic reduction in our revenue support grant from over the past decade, which is extremely difficult.”
National Trends and Projections
A survey of county councils this week also found council budgets being stretched by the increasing figures of young people and adults needing Send support.
The County Councils Network said that local shortfalls will hit 4.4 billion pounds a year by the end of the decade, as they struggle to cope with rising needs.
Ministers have put off planned reforms to the Send system until the coming year after a policy document setting out those changes has been postponed.
Disadvantage and Funding Shortfalls
Based on the most recent indices of deprivation (IMD) covering UK local authorities, many participating urban areas were included in the most disadvantaged in England.
- “Participating urban centers like several major towns place in the most deprived 30 across the country under the 2025 deprivation indices,” noted the study.
“While only a single urban area is in the top 10 for disadvantaged communities countrywide, urban areas are far more likely to be in the most deprived fifth of the nation. The figures highlights the scale of difficulties facing local leaders across key cities in the coming year,” the analysis added.
“Council officials have been explicit about the necessity for a fair and sustainable financial structure that accounts for and addresses the real levels of deprivation and need,” stated Michael Mordey.
“Lacking this, local authorities will continue to face impossible choices around which essential services to allocate spend to, and which to reduce, to the disadvantage of their communities.”
A fifth of local authorities have reduced or weakened social care provision in the past 12 months, the study revealed.
