Health, defence and schools were the big winners in the spending review, but the government claimed it would put local government back on ‘a sustainable footing’.
Health, defence and schools were the big winners in the spending review, but the government claimed it would put local government back on ‘a sustainable footing'.
Treasury documents revealed there will be an additional £3.4bn of grand funding to the sector in 2028-29 compared to 2024-25, a real terms increase in core spending of 3.1% across the spending review period.
While plans to update the local government funding mechanisms are yet to materialise, the Spending Review reiterate Government commitments to multi-year settlements, to simplify the funding, target cash to places ‘that need it most' and allocate money ‘in a way that empowers local leaders to deliver against local priorities'.
But deputy prime minister Angela Rayner secured extra funding for housing as the Government's ambition to build a further 1.5 million homes looked increasingly unlikely.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves described the move as ‘the biggest cash injection into social and affordable housing in the past decade.'
Alongside cash for the NHS, Reeves vowed to improve pay for social care workers.
She pledged to ‘end the costly use of asylum hotels', with £200m funding to transform the asylum system and clear the backlog, reducing costs by £1bn a year by 2038-29, ending the previous government's policy of ‘shunting the cost of failure on local communities'.
There was funding for 350 of the country's most deprived communities, including money for parks libraries and to clean up graffiti in a fund similar to the Conservative's levelling up funding.
And the Chancellor pledged to boost jobs and economic growth, using defence and green energy investments to improve areas across the country. She claimed the UK would become a ‘defence industrial superpower'.
There were also plans for £1.2bn a year to boost skills and jobs for young people.
An expected review of Special Educational Needs and Disabilities failed to materialise in the Chancellor's speech, but Spending Review documents revealed it will be in the schools bill expected in the Autumn.
A 10-year infrastructure strategy and industrial strategy will also follow later, but the expected review of the Treasury Green Book has been published in an effort to ‘make sure no region has treasury guidance wielded against them', the Chancellor said.
There was a raft of spending on transport, including plans to take forward Northern Powerhouse Rail, expand east-west rail, linking up the Oxford Cambridge arc, and improving the Midlands rail hub.
Citing the Cabinet Office's moves towards public service reform, Reeves vowed to ‘relentlessly' cut waste ‘with every single penny reinvested in public services.'
