Fair Funding Review

Lord Watts Excerpts

Monday 24th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Watts (Lab)]

My Lords, is it not the case that government funding and support should be based on need and should take into account the ability of the local authority to raise its own resources locally? During the last 13 years, this was moved away from. Are we going back to a similar system to that which operated for many years?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I agree with my noble friend that we need to make sure we realign funding with need and deprivation so that local authorities can deliver for their communities—as I said, the services that are needed and the economic growth that they need. The vast majority of councils with social care responsibilities will see their core spending power increase in real terms over the multi-year settlement. We will publish our response to the fair funding review and the policy statement and set out our plans for the first multi-year local government finance settlement. That is really important because it gives councils the certainty they need to plan over the medium to long term.