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Based on a new poll of local authorities, English councils are preparing to sell social clubs, sports centres, and shopping arcades as they bet on a rapid disposal of properties to balance the books.

Increasing Fiscal Pressures Prompt Asset Sales

The Key Cities Group for second-tier cities in England reported that six out of ten of councils are intending to dispose of properties to meet the escalating costs of adult and children’s social care.

Local governments have previously come under fire for disposing of playing fields and land to support their budgets, but they contend they must proceed to raise vital cash from property disposals or declare themselves bankrupt.

The group noted that a significant number of councils attempting to generate funds from a quick sale of holdings marked “a distinct shift from 2024, when the majority (60%) of municipal officials said they would focus on service redesigns and using financial reserves to weather growing fiscal pressures.”

Detailed Examples of Planned Sales

One local authority in Kent said its asset disposal plan featured the sale of a retail complex in Rainham and a social club in Rochester to raise £20m over five years.

• A local golf course and commercial properties owned in Worcestershire and Suffolk, which all provide rental income for Medway council, will additionally be sold under the strategy.

Local Levy Increases and Wider Financial Pressures

This research of councils in the coalition, which includes Sunderland, Southampton, Gloucester and Salford, also found that over seven in ten of authorities will have to raise local levies next April to address the rising cost of core provisions, increased rates of housing insecurity, and a persistent housing shortage.

Medway council explained it will press ahead with property disposals after sharp increases in the cost of children services, special educational needs and disability (Send) provision, adult social care, and temporary accommodation.

“We are taking creative strategies but some of these take time to deliver both better provisions and financial savings,” said a council leader.

He continued: “We face demographic pressures which will continue to increase the strains we have. As a unitary authority, we had a drastic reduction in our central funding from over the past decade, which is extremely difficult.”

National Trends and Forecasts

A survey of regional authorities this week also found council budgets being strained by the growing number of children and older individuals needing special educational assistance.

A network of councils said that local shortfalls will reach £4.4bn a year by 2029, as they struggle to manage increased demand.

Ministers have delayed planned reforms to the special educational needs framework until next year after a white paper setting out those changes was recently delayed.

Deprivation and Financial Gaps

According to the latest deprivation measures (the Index of Multiple Deprivation) for English councils, many key cities members were included in the most deprived in England.

• “Member cities like Hull, Bradford, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Wolverhampton place in the top 30 nationally under the 2025 IMD measures,” said the report.

“Although only a single urban area is among the ten most deprived for deprived neighbourhoods countrywide, urban areas are far more likely to be in the worst-off 20% of England. The data underscores the scale of challenges facing local leaders across major urban centers in the next twelve months,” the report added.

“Local government leaders have been clear about the need for a fair and sustainable financial structure that reflects and addresses the actual extent of disadvantage and need,” said a council leader.

“Lacking this, local authorities will persist to face impossible choices around which vital provisions to allocate spend to, and which to cut, to the detriment of their residents.”

A fifth of local authorities have reduced or weakened social care provision in the last year, the study found.