Chief secretary to the Treasury Liz Truss has refused to rule out further cuts to local government funding.
In an interview with BBC Newsnight at the Conservative Party conference this week, Truss was quizzed on the sustainability of local government finances
She said: “What we have done with local authorities is that they are now able to raise much more money locally than they were able to do before.
“When we went into government in 2010 the vast amount of the money they spent was from national government. They are now raising it locally. We have given them additional flexibility in council tax but of course we keep reviewing that and we have the local government settlement coming up.
When asked to rule out more cuts to local government funding, she said: “We are not making cuts to local authorities. What we are doing is giving them more revenue raising powers so that decision can be taken locally. I think it is really important that local councilors are responsible for the decisions they make.”
Responding to the comments on Twitter, shadow communities secretary Andrew Gwynne, said: “1) Gov grant goes to areas with a low council tax base (band A/B homes). They can’t raise enough £ for services 2) You’ve cut the grant by 50%. A 50% cut = a lot of £ lost 3) You can’t plug the gap with council tax. It won’t raise enough. Go back to point 1.”
