Councils in Greater Manchester have had their budgets cut by nearly a quarter over the last 14 years, according to new research. Across England, the poorest councils have faced real-term cuts worth almost three times as much as the richest local authorities, the research by a special interest group has revealed.
SIGOMA, the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities, found that the biggest real-term cut to a council in Greater Manchester was nearly 30 pc. Manchester council's budget is now worth 29.9 pc less than it was in 2010/11 financial year when the figures are adjusted for inflation, SIGOMA revealed.
Last year, a Labour councillor said the scale of council cuts in Manchester since austerity would be enough to buy Manchester United. Since 2010, the town hall says it has had to make savings of £428m a year to cope with funding cuts under and keep up with inflation costs and population growth.
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According to Manchester council, if it had only received the average cut to its funding, it would have £77m a year more to spend on services. To plug the shortfall, local authorities across the country have been raising council tax.
But less than a third of Manchester town hall's budget comes from council tax. Its Labour leader says the whole council tax system is 'fundamentally unfair' because poorer areas like Manchester cannot collect as much money from it.
SIGOMA has also revealed that Oldham and Rochdale have faced real-term council cuts of 29.1 pc and 28.4 pc respectively. Stockport council's budget is said to be worth 17.9 pc less now while Trafford's is down 21 pc in that time.
Meanwhile, Surrey County Council, where Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is an MP, saw spending power fall by 8.3 pc during the same period. The data shows that the 10 richest councils in the country received a 10.1 pc cut on average while the 10 poorest councils in England faced a real-term cut of 28.3 pc.
Barnsley council's Labour leader Stephen Houghton who chairs the SIGOMA - a group which all councils in Greater Manchester belongs to - said the current funding model tends to reward areas with high-value housing and thriving businesses. Sir Stephen said that this has resulted in an increased disparity between the wealthiest areas of England which rely less on grant funding and can raise more from council tax, business rates and other funding sources.
He said: "The poorest areas have seen the biggest cuts and for 'levelling up' to mean anything the government should be looking to reverse these cuts and create a funding formula that funding according to council needs."
It comes as SIGOMA unveils a new manifesto titled 'For a Sustainable and Fairer Future'. The manifesto suggests a series or local government reforms.
SIGOMA's research found councils in Greater Manchester have faced an average real-term cut of 24.5 pc. Each council has been affected as follows:
- Bolton -25.3 pc
- Bury -22.0 pc
- Manchester -29.9 pc
- Oldham -29.1 pc
- Rochdale -28.4 pc
- Salford -22.9 pc
- Stockport -17.9 pc
- Tameside -23.3 pc
- Trafford -21.0 pc
- Wigan -25.1 pc
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities was contacted for comment but declined due to restrictions during the pre-election period.
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