Councils lose over half a million jobs in ten years as new research lays funding crisis bare

Over a third of staff have been lost from councils across England and Wales during the past decade, new research has revealed.

Almost 600,000 council jobs have gone since 2012, a new study by GMB shows. The union said that the number of workers in local authorities in England and Wales was 1.89 million. By 2024, this number had fallen to 1.29 million.