According to a new poll of municipal councils, English councils are planning to sell community centers, athletic facilities, and retail spaces as they bet on a fire sale of properties to stabilize finances.
Growing Fiscal Challenges Prompt Asset Sales
The Key Cities Group representing major urban areas in the UK reported that six out of ten of local authorities are planning to sell assets to meet the escalating costs of adult and children’s social care.
Councils have in the past faced criticism for disposing of public land and land to shore up their finances, but they argue they must continue to generate essential revenue from property disposals or declare themselves bankrupt.
The group noted that a significant number of councils seeking to raise money from a fire sale of assets represented “a clear change from 2024, when the majority (six in ten) of municipal officials said they would prioritise service redesigns and utilising financial reserves to manage growing fiscal pressures.”
Detailed Examples of Proposed Sales
Medway Council in southeast England announced its asset disposal plan included 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 business parks held in Worcestershire and Suffolk, which all provide rental income for Medway council, will additionally be sold under the strategy.
Local Levy Increases and Broader Financial Pressures
The survey of local authorities in the key cities group, which includes Sunderland, Southampton, Gloucester and Salford, also found that more than 70% of authorities will need to raise council taxes next April to address the rising cost of core provisions, increased rates of homelessness, and a longstanding housing shortage.
Medway council explained it will proceed with property disposals after steep rises in the cost of youth support, special educational needs and disability (Send) provision, adult social care, and temporary accommodation.
“We are adopting innovative approaches but certain measures require time to achieve both better provisions and cost efficiency,” stated a council leader.
He added: “We face demographic pressures which will persist to add to the pressures 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
Research of county councils this week further found council budgets being stretched by the growing number of young people and adults needing special educational assistance.
A network of councils projected that council deficits will hit 4.4 billion pounds a year by 2029, as they struggle to manage increased demand.
Government officials have delayed scheduled changes to the Send system until the coming year after a white paper setting out those changes has been postponed.
Disadvantage and Funding Gaps
Based on the most recent indices of deprivation (the Index of Multiple Deprivation) for English councils, many key cities members were included in the most disadvantaged in England.
- “Participating urban centers like Hull, Bradford, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Wolverhampton rank in the most deprived 30 nationally under the 2025 deprivation indices,” said the report.
“While only one key city is in the top 10 for deprived neighbourhoods countrywide, cities are much more prone to be in the most deprived fifth of the nation. The figures underscores the extent of difficulties facing local leaders across major urban centers in the coming year,” the report concluded.
“Council officials have been explicit about the necessity for a fair and sustainable financial structure that reflects and responds to the real levels of deprivation and demand,” said a council leader.
“Without this, councils will continue to face impossible choices around which essential services to allocate spend to, and which to reduce, to the disadvantage of their residents.”
A fifth of councils have cut or compromised social care provision in the past 12 months, the survey found.
