Councils are legally obliged to house people in need of housing. With no council housing, they are forced to rent privately owned properties, and we all know how expensive the rental market is. Councils are also obliged to look after children in foster care. Many children’s homes are run by the private sector and charge councils £250k per child per year. There are many issues facing councils, but these are just two of examples of the private sector sponging off the state due to past government policies.
@heinkle1 because they don't get the funding to do it. Particularly in cities we're land is precious. Thatcher actually banned revenue from council house sales being used to build new council houses which still exists in many places today. This failure was either planned or never stopped as house price appreciation fuelled boomers retirements at the cost of future generations as they are still the biggest voting block
@@getnohappy The Uk voting cycle Vote in the tories Watch them crash the economy Continue voting the tories Finally vote in Labour Get upset when all problems aren't fixed immediately Repeat
Labour have clearly demonstrated they don't get the problem or the solution. They write a growth budget which fundamentally will reduce growth. The government is the worst allocator of growth money in existence. The conservatives get the theory of the problem that's taught, but sadly that's largely not the whole truth. (Hence why they become politicians not bankers because they wouldn't make much money as a banker). They give tax breaks to companies but then don't really understand why their money goes down not up. (It's because the growth is being absorbed). The real reason we are so stagnant is simply asset price inflation of land and housing and property. Simply follow the money and you'll find out yourself. What would happen if your house costs decreased by 10% overnight? Who would lose? Who would win? That's your answer.
@@shosc16 Okay, so you obviously haven't watched the video, because it clearly states that government funding of local councils fell by half over the course of the Tory "government".
Absolutely. The people, budget, and responsibility should be transferred to the NHS. Then the NHS will ensure that people who no longer need to be in hospital will move into social care as it makes financial sense for them. At the moment councils haven't got enough money, so when the NHS comes asking for a place for somebody it is in the councils interest to leave them in hospital as they aren't paying for that.
The NHS does not even have a centralized system for tracking patient records! And that exists in the US with all its private healthcare nonsense going on! There is talks about incorporating Epic Hyperspace but that’s looking super far out. Centralization makes a lot of sense for these issues.
@@davidjohnson5635a central database for personnel would be a big improvement for lots of things. For instance when you move house, just one form to complete. I think Denmark does this
@@DarkKnight_ The Dollar never falls when the FED prints billions upon billions in QE. If councils borrowed at 0% or at a few percent, bankers elsewhere would make less and bonuses would lower. Greed is good, so they say.
@@paulking20391. the dollar is the world's reserve currency, you Muppet. 2. base rate is 5%, not 0% 3. BoE money printing has stuffed the economy, the last thing we need is reckless councils borrowing more printed money that they will never pay back
Because the BoE doesn’t lend at 0%. The current national interest rate is 4.75% - that is the rate at which the BoE can loan to government and council (edit: this increased from historically low rates to slow down inflation)
Unless they suddenly built millions of houses its impossible. Huge proportions of their budget (often over 50%) is now spent on private rents for often ex council houses. Problem with thatcherism was eventually it runs out of state assets to sell on the cheap.
@IRGodful that is they have been forced to do, but that's either more expensive for the government or less services for the people, the tories chose the latter, and Labour seem to be choosing the former
Councils main spending is on housing for vulnerable people. They have to pay private landlords humungous rents to be able to do this. If only they had some property of their own that they could use for this purpose. They could call them council houses... lol
@@terrymorton9941 its a good chance because they boosted up the ladder because they don't have savings, generally have kids and will probably have some disability or wife who doesn't speak any English.
@@shosc16 While that is true, what really creates the cost is the red tape required to fix the pothole. The government and local councils complain about cost but add laborious, unnecessary regulation where it's not needed.
Red tape is a big problem. I work for the local council, and have offered to do a simple job such as replace broken locks for the public toilets where i work as the local beach warden. Their answer is no, they need to hire someone for that..... i ask why? Iv the tools, jst say yes and its done, and itl not cost them anything. Again answer is know because "reasons are various" ...still havent fixed the public toielts where both male and female toilets do NOT LOCK
@@jontalbot1is he wrong though? there are plenty of examples from other people who actually budget/use the uk’s finances who also agree that we have stifling amounts of bureaucracy
Local councils need changing (IE:Fired) They ALL seem to be running us into the ground, making up stupid rules and blocking even local citizens from fixing things for cheap or free. They are power-mad mini-dictators. Imagine refusing new business or people building anything because one or two people said it would "spoil their view".
@@jontalbot1 rather dismissive, not sure that attitude will help anyone particularly! I worked in the Housing Dept at Edinburgh Council for 4 years. Even in my entry level job, this sort of problem was recurrent. In order for all council money to be traceable the level of bureaucracy is incredibly high, and processes are arduous. There must be protocols followed in order for everything to adhere to legislation. The rules are strict and the money is tight, no wonder it's slow.
Councils too busy spending 15%-20% of their budgets on private landlords for temporary and emergency accomodation because of the shortage of social housing. I'll leave it others to speculate as to why there's a shortage in the first place.
@@AnthonyT142 Councils didn't have a choice about selling their housing stock. When Thatcher introduced right to buy in the 1980s they had to sell their housing stock to the tenants at a huge discount if the tenant wanted to buy. And even if they'd been able to use the money from those sales to build new houses they would have been building them at a loss when the new tenants decided they wanted to buy.
The whole council system needs an overhaul. Money is being spent in the worst ways possible. They are inherently inefficient with too many line managers and not enough ground crew.
As someone who works as an independant professional for a local government, can I add that this was a very clear and concise summary of the situation. We are all hoping so desperately that the new national government can focus sooner rather than later on the local governments. I know it's more money thrown at a seeming money pit, but it's not frivolous spending, it's core services. Adult Social Care is on its knees at the moment, with even legally required services being cut right back. We need this multi-year approach fast!
@@alistairmonroperhaps naming some would help. We need more local consultation, before schemes go ahead, which means we need more people to engage with their council. They are up against apathy, in their defence.
@@alistairmonro There absolutely have been in many cases, certainly where they've set up companies or in cases like Birmingham, but right now, with most the various councils, they weren't free spending. But now they, including my own, which is classed as a "well-run" council, as it has no projects or mad lottery schemes, are broke. There is no money to spend on social care, essential services, etc., so it's not a request for more money to burn, it's more money to keep people alive.
Yes, poor people need to be punished and stretched further to councils and can have gold plated pensions and pay extortionate salaries to employees. You know instead of trim the fat.
Our council is closing schools!!We’ve already had a raise each year of council tax. We’ve just had one of 5%. Business rent has gone up. We’ve been given an uplift by government, but we are still struggling…
As someone thats been illegally living in a commercial warehouse for the last 7 months cause my income doesn't pay me enough to afford Rent and Council Tax. I'd like to personally admit this was probably my fault. Sorry It's really cold in here at night though.
The amount councils pay private contractors for things like IT it is no wonder they're going under. Southampton City Council were paying an IT consultant £800 a day to build their system that didn't even work.
No wonder if they were only paying £800 a day. That is far far below market rate, especially if done through an agency and half what would be paid if it was a consultancy company supplying the contractor.
@@johnpower29Astronomical cheap 😂 I would do it for 1k per month and guarantee it will gone work. 800£ per day is just corrupt councils games. Consulting about projects usually is free because communication is necessary to even understand and build anything 😂
@@THETRUTHISOUTTHERE-m9v No, you wouldn't do it for 1K a month, that would be £5.76 per hour assuming a 40 hour work week. Minimum wage is £11.44. Wages for a software engineer start around £17 per hour and only go upwards depending on experience.
I work at Birmingham Council. Things are pretty crazy right now though most people saw some form of disaster coming as we have been struggling to get funding for years. It was especially the 'cap in hand approach' that seems to cause an enormous amount of chaos. With that being said those of us below the exec and senior level were furious to learn some of the crap that the so called 'leaders' have approved and pushed for over the years leading to the current problems with equal pay and Oracle (which still hasn't been fixed), there has been literally no accountability for those in positions of power as they show up spin some plates for a few years or seagull on a bunch of projects then piss off to their next exec job with BCC on their resume. It sucks because a lot of the people I work with are in the Council to make the city better and make things better for residents but the cuts and section 114 notice have been devastating and completely hamstring anything we can do to try and improve stuff on the ground, we have and continue to loose officers who have worked at the Council for 30+ years who are leaving for greener pastures or just retiring. Just makes me sad man this isn't what I joined the Council to see or do.
Everyone's starting to feel it, don't be so hard on yourself. It's death by a thousand cuts, the nation has been ignoring this looming disaster since the end of WW2, and definitely since the 1980's. The collapse needs to go full swing before anything gets addressed. I wish I could say we're nearly through the worst of it... We aren't, so prepare your mindset. It might not be what you signed up to the council for, but there's never any guarantee on what times we see or when. It's easier to deal with once you accept the reality of it. It will get worse, more things will fall apart, more sorrow and despair will occur, more human suffering, more frustrations. Once you accept this, it's then a matter of doing what you can until you feel you no longer can. But always know that nothing is permanent, everything changes. We're just at a point where things are in collapse. It was unavoidable after the loss of empire 100 years ago. Everything since has just been the slow economic death. In another 50 years it will balance out, and we'll be a vassal state of one of the super-continent systems that are forming. Whether that's Europe or America is yet to be seen. But it won't happen until there's two to three generations on from the miners strikes and the boomer generation. They're too invested in a world that once was, and believe it can come back... Which anyone with any sense can see that it won't. Once you accept "where" we are. Then it becomes easier to function and take the weight off. It is what it is, and you just do the best you can amongst the systems cascade. Whatever remains once the collapse reaches it's zenith is then something that can be rebuilt from. It's not about fixing it all back to a working state. It's now about salvaging what can be salvaged and letting what needs to fall away fall away. Not an easy thing to come to terms with, but it's currently the only mindset that will prevent false hopes from being continually dashed. Watch for the minor miracles within the process, and the small saving graces here and there. Thanks for everything you do! 💚
While I do not see how giving more money to councils will solve anything, councils & government need to think carefully about generating more money using the resources councils have. Central government, for example, pays housing benefit. A large amount of that now goes to private landlords. If councils were to build properties - they could, in theory, receive that money. Successful planning applications could also attract a cash development charge paid by developers to councils - thus incentivising building - and councils could lease out land they own for renewable energy generation. (Apart from the potentially profitable planning permission to put in the renewables). Business rates could be extended to energy generation rates too, the more generated, the more the councils earn. Austerity has had its day - we need effective management in these councils that is enabled by the government.
@@allthenewsordeath5772 Bingo… the economic benefit of construction cannot be overstated…. and energy… well, without energy you can do nothing. We need both… incentivise the councils to do both.
@@allthenewsordeath5772 It's already plenty easy. The problem is that housebuilders won't build "more than the market can absorb" in a given space of time, which is another way of saying they won't build enough to cause prices to go down.
One thing not talked about here is the loss of local businesses, banks, etc. in place of online services, which means that local councils are losing income from business rates and that money is now ending up in central government through corporation tax, etc. (or not at all if the online companies are using various avoidance tactics.)
Councils need to stop selling services to their mates, for extortionate prices, grabbing the back handers, problem solved just make it regulation to publish spending figures and who signed off on them, maybe stop using paper invoices that disappear.
london floats the economy of the rest of the country that would make no difference. the issue isn’t the north sending money down south the issue is the rest of the country being so poor it can’t afford to support itself and the government being too scared to invest in the north when it’s pretty much guaranteed to make a return in the south
@@BluePuffyy It's been our problem for a thousand years, a thousand years of harrying, deprivation, serfdom, industrialisation, "renewal" and "levelling up" Even the old Labour party, a Northern and Scottish ideal, has been taken over and corrupted by Centre-Right Red Tories, with their crocodile smiles as they desecrate the Red Flag. I keep it flying here. Red _and_ Yellow. The colours of our North.
@@BluePuffyy Even still, using funds set aside for "Levelling up" the "Northern Powerhouse" on London and the South is outright scandalous. The south always takes, it never gives. Give me my country.
It's laughable that councils can afford to pay out gold plated pension schemes i.e. defined benefits pensions (rather than normal pensions what everyone gets in private sector).
Business rates are killing shops. It’s a ridiculous way to fund your social services. Just nationalise the cost of the councils, why are we relying on these little feifdom tax collectors?
The government can't just magically conjure up the money either (at least not without causing inflation that will hurt consumer spending and thus hurt shops even more). So if the councils are abolished, you would instead need a national tax to fund the social services. You would get roughly the same tax burden, just the organization of how it's done would change.
The current local government system was introduced by Thatcher to, essentially, shield central governments from the effects of her policies. It works so easily. Family friend was a local counselor, and after 2010 the number of people who just would not accept "they cut our budget by 50%" as a reason services were worse was insane.
@@accountnamewithheld The opposite is true since it is much more expensive to supply services in rural areas but you carry on feeling victimized. It’s fashionable right now
As someone who has lived for a long time both in and out of the UK, it is disappointing to not see many of the structural causes of council bankruptcy being addressed. City councils have been shaped in times of peak suburbanite car use - where planning laws restrict housing to happen at low density in sprawling expansions around the cities. Building and maintaining infrastructure and services (especially car infrastructure, water and electrical distribution, waste management) becomes extremely expensive and unsustainable in this sprawling scale. This is a known problem that is ever impoverishing USA's suburbs (even more extremely than in the UK). There are two solutions: 1-Re-densify productive centres in a modern, planned way, by bringing housing and business back into cities, and thus more tax money to be spent in a smaller area (Scottish Government is well on its way on implementing this strategy) 2-Divide councils, so that economically productive centres can spend it on themselves, without having to subsidise the suburban Sprawl. This is an effective, yet cruel approach - because if the populations that live in suburbs actually had to pay the infrastructure costs of where they live, they would be LEAGUES away from being able to afford it. Councils are having to face the consequences of development practices from a time where there was no sustainable sensibility to land use financing. Back then, if it was cheap to build somewhere, then surely you should, not ever thinking of how the development would be maintained in the future.
It's much less of a problem in the UK to be fair. New high-rise apartment buildings are being constructed pretty frequently, and with the decline in foreign university attendance, a lot of what universities have built recently is only seeing a fraction of occupants. That stuff could probably be sold to councils at a steep discount and much of it would be able to be used as council housing without needing much alteration. The other problem is consumer demand though. Flats are associated with students, young professionals, and poor people. There aren't many in this country that are fit for families or aimed at a higher income middle age demographic, because it wouldn't sell. People prefer living in a sprawlhouse because that's been an image of independence and success for so long, even though it means long travel times, high fuel costs and expensive mortgages.
I work in local government in adult and children’s social care, and it’s really bad. I’ve had to make cuts that reduce support for each claimant by up to £16k per year. This funding is meant to cover essential services like social work, caregiving-everything-and the money just isn’t there. It’s heartbreaking to tell a family that their father or child can’t get the support they need, even though we initially said it would happen. For those who say, "I work in local government, and the amount of waste is unreal," you must not be working anywhere near me or just not working in local government, because here, everything is already cut to the bone.
If Birmingham can overspend 80m on an IT project I'd suspect there is quite a lot of waste. I guess this won't happen everywhere but there's some shocking examples out there. My local council has just approved a section of road to be built. It's costing £17.3 Million and is about 400m long, or £42,000/meter. Madness
@@jontalbot1 £43M / kilometer ( £69Million / mile) isn't just expensive it's a ridiculous fee. If we really accept these sorts of figures there's no helping us. The average earner pays around £8.3k in income tax, so that 400m stretch of road consumed the entire income tax take of more than 2000 people for an entire year. It's a joke
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Council's being bankrupt isn't new, and an increase in government funding isn't a bad thing. But labour need to reclaim the money that was unjustly palmed off to tory doners. As well as a shift to keynesian style economics. (or post Keynesian)
Because everyone seems too scared to even mention the word immigrants, let’s all appreciate how our open boarder love everyone policy is now making everyone worse off than ever….
The problem with councils and mp's is that there is no accountability for their spending, if there was then you can bet councils won't be wasting money on silly projects
And if we’re spending less & less on European contribution, health, education AND council services, where exactly is the money going? …multi-year enquiries into scandals under central government purview amongst other leakages… 🤔
@Jeevessss The UK isn't too expensive to run, we're just not charging market-rate rents to the finance industry. Raise taxes on the London businesses that are taking advantage of us and running the country becomes affordable.
In the US, local governments often have referenda for increasing tax for some particular purpose (schools, building a stadium, etc.), and these usually pass. So it's interesting to me that you view this sort of thing as dead-on-arrival in the UK.
In the US, local governments are the main funders of school, which to me is most horrific way I've ever heard of to fund them. Since then poor kids have less money for their education. The US also has a very high focus on land taxes. Which are actually a good tax, but unusual.
It's incredibly un-even in the UK, the multi-millionaire with a 10 bedroom house gets charged the same amount in council tax as the 1 bed semi-detached down the same road. The poorer couple don't want to pay anymore council tax otherwise they'll be unable to afford the rent, the millionaire doesn't want to pay more tax because he enjoys his holiday's.
Because any extra tax raised goes into the black hole of paying for social care. Nobody would ever see a school or a stadium etc. We pay more and more every year and see less and less for it, with libraries and sports facilities closing down, roads that don't get maintained, etc etc. The video didn't really cover it but over 90% of council spending goes on social care and education. There is very little left to do anything else.
@@Burty117 Ah, I hadn't realized that council tax was regressive in that way. In the US, local government revenue usually comes mostly from sales tax (which is also regressive) and property tax, but property tax is usually calculated as roughly: the current assessed value of your property divided by the total value of all taxable property, multiplied by the total tax levy. So US property tax is very much like a pure wealth tax (though only on real estate).
@@FireEverLiving Yeah technically, Council tax is based on several factors, how many bedrooms, how many people live in said property, and mainly how much the house is worth, unfortunately, those figures are from the 90's, all houses here are worth way more now, so effectively, everyone is on the highest tax bracket.
They aren't. The rules of the game are rigged against councils being as efficient as they could be. Procurement rules are a joke and are not there to get the best value for councils, they are there to protect the interests of suppliers. The red tape that councils have to deal with isn't put in place by the councils, it is put in place by central government and government quangos. Governments won't remove it because that would take away the only advantage the private sector have when it comes to council contracts. i.e. they can compete because they don't have to follow the same red tape rules as the council themselves do. So there is "waste" but it is by design.
a lot of it is down to the austerity and cuts introduced by the tories, they cut funding to labour councils in particular. So many councils did risky business initiatives that didn't workout and they lost money on.
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There are two problems with this. First it would reinforce inequality. Raising the same amount of Council tax in Surrey requires a lower level of Council Tax than say Hartlepool. Second, the Treasury likes to have overall control of national spending. Planning the national accounts etc would be very difficult
Councils going bankrupt is a national scandal in the 6th richest nation on earth. Many of us assumed one of labours first acts would be to increase the funding to councils after massive Tory cuts. Non of the cuts helped pay off our debts, the debt increased 1.85Trillion under the Tories and left councils on the brink. Labour babbled on about black holes in the budget, while giving councils just a few beans. Social care costs from council tax are £4 out of every £5, all other services paid for with the remaining £1 out of £5. Why are council taxpayers paying for social care ? when it's a national problem. We have the money for war, but not social care, on Labours head be it in 2029.
The councils are in trouble because they keep wasting money on Didn't Earn It token employees and vanity projects, instead of on what the council tax is supposed to be spent on.
Councils also make money from investments. The best councils have done this successfully. The worst coumcils have made a mess and lost money pushing them further to 'bankruptcy'
Just why we're are being burdened by "adult social care" then and with so much higher demand? If one hasn't been responsible for their life and prep for their retirement then the natural outcome would be that person won't be able to support the spendings once out of the job market. I appreciate there'd be other factors contribute to ones life events which lead to the outcome, but it kinda feels like we're creating a system to encourage people not be responsible for themselves and tell them there'll be free money for them regardless, pay by all other tax payers. The truth is, at this rate and attitude, there'll never be enough funding for those services, and the country simply has no money to keep going down this route. As brutal as it may sound, people should bear the consequences of their own life decisions rather than keep having the country to pay for their failures indefinitely
Well done lettuce Liz, could have fixed this about 13 times over without that 40 billion loss you gave us. never mind how many times the money lost from Brexit could have relieved this 👏 👏 👏
Councils do not pay it, it is the council tax payers ! Nice pay rise for council staff ! I have worked indirectly with two council’s they have a habit of hiding money!
I lived in Birmingham up until July 24. I couldn't understand how the council allowed weekly bin collections, new speed humps with 20mph signs on a nearby stretch of road, consulting about reducing speed limits on about 25 roads and able to get an environmental health officer to inspect my privately rented property within about a week. Most of these were surprisingly when there are vast changes when I lived in Derby and Sheffield. Both of these areas, at the time, had higher council taxes.
We all want to pay less tax , but we all still want generous child/poor/ elderly benefits ,better NHS,better roads,better schools ,stronger army ,more generous gov pensions ,more housing (but not in green belts) , no inheritance tax.
The native British population is actually going down by hundreds of thousands every decade due to declining birth rates, I wonder where the strain on public services is coming from?
so the increase in elderly social care has increased significantly but yet we are being told that they dont need winter fuel payments as they are all well off homeowners? kinda contradictory in what is being said by the general media and in this video.
The first thing to do is get Labour out of local councils - non-Labour candidates can’t even get onto the ballot paper at local council elections in Labour stronghold areas - and Labour controlled councils are even joining up with other Labour controlled councils in adjoining areas to protect “safe” Labour council seats, to hold on to power even more tightly
@@AppleAirsoftA country normally has a census to determine the projected growth of a population, then they expand the health services, roads , schools and councils to accommodate the growth or decline . Having open borders means that nothing can be planned for ! All our services are overwhelmed, our infrastructure is overwhelmed, our councils are skint, our public finances are non existent and the government is literally scrambling to find any way they can to generate more money and unique ways to borrow…… while at the same time wages are stagnant and everything is more expensive! Now explain why that’s knuckle dragging? If I had built a one bedroom house for me and my wife ….. it’s sufficient because we have no kids yet …. But say she got pregnant with triplets….. now that house no longer meats the requirement it was built for !
This vlog misses a critical point in where councils raise revenue from. You list 3 ways, however there is a massive 4th income stream, namely charging for services and impositions of fines. Many councils are generating tens of millions of £s this way. Sadly this revenue stream is ignored by the left. Birmingham is a basket case based with bad management who should be sacked and criminally charged.
People should note including those that created this video, that councils in Wales, England, Scotland and Northern Ireland all have different rules and regulations. Business rates in Wales for example don't go to councils, and Welsh councils can increase council tax without referendums.
You fail to mention here that the localism act only applies to England. Welsh councils have raised council tax more than 5% in the past few years. The minister for local government and housing in the welsh government can cap any rise but have decided not to.
You've not directly called out the minimum wage increase and national insurance rate rise. These two factors will massively increase the burden on council spending. On the one hand, dirictly affecting local government employees. But also private sector companies providing services paid for by councils, such as nursing homes and childcare centres. This budget will not be relief to councils, it will squeeze them harder than before.
The problem as I see it is that social care requires ever increasing resources but as these are statutory services that must be provided, the only way councils can fund these is by cutting back more and more on the things that people think they pay their council tax for - bins, parks, libraries etc. This creates a situation whereby people feel like they pay more for ever decreasing services. I'm not saying councils should cut social care but central gov should recognise this and fund it separately to other council areas.
Either they can fund social care - or they can give councils more money to fund social care. Similarly they can fund temporary accommodation - or they can give councils more money to fund temporary accommodation. These are the ONLY two things that are bankrupting councils, and both are not the fault of local government. It's out of their hands. Shoveling someone else's stables. Simple.
This is utterly ridiculous, if a business was to operate like this it would collapse. These council have almost guaranteed income. I think councils need to be run more like a business. The mindset of having guaranteed income vs not working for the money makes a huge difference in people's approach. If you know you're getting the money then you don't really care whereas from a business point of view your more conservative with the way money in spent. An £80mil overspend is shocking. These council have finance people to advise them, they should all get fired and if this is happening across the board they need to hire business man to run the council.
A good start in Birmingham would to be reduce the number of Councillors! There are 92! If you live in UK, you might think that’s OK. Auckland Council has a mayor and 20 Councillors, and has a similar population to Birmingham. Elderly care and State care for children, however, is provided by Central Government. For those who can afford it, the elderly pay for private care, with a cut off eligibility of a certain amount of money and property. This becomes a little more complicated if one of a couple has to go into care because their health needs cannot be catered for in the family home. The same problem is arising all round the globe with a large cohort of people reaching retirement age, the wave of which will take at least 20 years to pass.
Many Councils have a 4th source of income that can be significant. Fees and Charges for a range of services such as car parking, commercial property rentals, markets, sports pitches, burials and cremations, even ports and airports. Plainly this source of income is not something that can be dialled up in the short-term. It requires a very long-term policy by the local authority but I have worked for several councils where it has been a larger source of income than Council Tax on domestic premises. Newcastle under Lyme and Portsmouth used to be exemplars.
Councils do for big IT projects. The first tender that goes out is for a consultancy to help them draft the requirements specification and to assist them in choosing a supplier to implement said big project.
US municipal governments rarely go bankrupt (Chapter 9), so what is the US and it’s municipalities doing, to where municipal bankruptcy is fairly rare, but it feels more acute in the UK? Since 1988, at least 28 municipalities and counties have filed for Chapter 9, ranging from a small town like Moffet, OK (pop. 160), to places like Detroit, and Orange County, CA. 15 of those did happen from 2007 until 2013, due in large part to the Great Recession
I ran for councilor 3 days ago for liberal Democrats in Scotland. I lost. I will run again in 2 years. I am 24yrs old. I am... Concerned over the future of local councils wnd the public
Good video, even if councils don't S114, they are unable to deliver decent services. People are fed up with poor services, and don't understand how much funding has been cut in the last decade.
it dose not help when you have major councils merge like Bournemouth Christchurch and Poole who then lose all the savings and have spent them before the paint on the new logo dries.
A single naughty child who needed placement could potentially cost a council £1 million quid annually. So do the math. If you only had 500 of them in a single local authority. They are effectively bankrupt.
So much housing benefit money goes directly to landlords and they run schemes on how to maximise profits by dividing houses into HMOs and charging max per room meaning less houses for families and higher rents everywhere
Why are foreigners in hotels or our council houses whilst our own are sleeping rough on the streets when their ancestors paid for these council houses through their rents.Are we all backwards.
Councils are legally obliged to house people in need of housing. With no council housing, they are forced to rent privately owned properties, and we all know how expensive the rental market is. Councils are also obliged to look after children in foster care. Many children’s homes are run by the private sector and charge councils £250k per child per year. There are many issues facing councils, but these are just two of examples of the private sector sponging off the state due to past government policies.
But why aren’t councils building council-owned houses?
@@heinkle1 they are, but not nearly enough to keep up with demand.
@heinkle1 because they don't get the funding to do it. Particularly in cities we're land is precious. Thatcher actually banned revenue from council house sales being used to build new council houses which still exists in many places today. This failure was either planned or never stopped as house price appreciation fuelled boomers retirements at the cost of future generations as they are still the biggest voting block
@Jeevessss That would explain why there is no housing, and the out of control prices.
@Jeevessss 'not in my backyard' (NIMB) has been a common things amongst MP's for ages.
Is anything not in crisis in this country?
Yes. MP's salaries and expenses.
@@davidmcculloch8490 Heaven forbid, I'd hate to imagine our MPs aren't getting their bar tab paid, how would the country run!?
YourMotherIsACrisis
Brexit means brexit
@@davidmcculloch8490, MPs don't decide their own pay.
UK: cuts council funding by 50%
UK 10 years later: “councils crisis😱” (how did this happen?!)
UK population: "I can't believe Starmer hasn't fixed it yet, Labour have betrayed their voters".
@@getnohappy The Uk voting cycle
Vote in the tories
Watch them crash the economy
Continue voting the tories
Finally vote in Labour
Get upset when all problems aren't fixed immediately
Repeat
@@Llotel972 watch labour sell off all of the gold reserves when gold was at its lowest price
@@cazadon
It wasn't the lowest though.
Labour have clearly demonstrated they don't get the problem or the solution.
They write a growth budget which fundamentally will reduce growth. The government is the worst allocator of growth money in existence.
The conservatives get the theory of the problem that's taught, but sadly that's largely not the whole truth. (Hence why they become politicians not bankers because they wouldn't make much money as a banker).
They give tax breaks to companies but then don't really understand why their money goes down not up. (It's because the growth is being absorbed).
The real reason we are so stagnant is simply asset price inflation of land and housing and property.
Simply follow the money and you'll find out yourself. What would happen if your house costs decreased by 10% overnight? Who would lose? Who would win? That's your answer.
The national government giving less money to Councils while expecting them to do more work is as illogical as it is unsustainable.
What is your solution?
@@flickthenick...Fund councils better. I'd have thought that was obvious.
@@josephharrison8354 So they can waste more money. Needs more than just throwing money at councils
@josephharrison8354 yes that is obvious, where should this funding come from, this is the point of my question obviously...
@@shosc16 Okay, so you obviously haven't watched the video, because it clearly states that government funding of local councils fell by half over the course of the Tory "government".
Imo, social care should be centralised. There must be so much duplicated admin with it being handled by each council
Absolutely. The people, budget, and responsibility should be transferred to the NHS. Then the NHS will ensure that people who no longer need to be in hospital will move into social care as it makes financial sense for them. At the moment councils haven't got enough money, so when the NHS comes asking for a place for somebody it is in the councils interest to leave them in hospital as they aren't paying for that.
The NHS does not even have a centralized system for tracking patient records! And that exists in the US with all its private healthcare nonsense going on! There is talks about incorporating Epic Hyperspace but that’s looking super far out. Centralization makes a lot of sense for these issues.
@@davidjohnson5635a central database for personnel would be a big improvement for lots of things. For instance when you move house, just one form to complete. I think Denmark does this
@@davidjohnson5635Pretty sure Sunak attempted this but he had to go and fulfil his self interests by asking his father-in-law's company to make it.
Social care should be merged with the NHS and the NHS itself devolved to local authorities, while keeping a central personnel database.
Why are local councils borrowing money from commercial banks at 6% and not from the bank of England at 0% interest rate?
Pound will fall😊
@@DarkKnight_ The Dollar never falls when the FED prints billions upon billions in QE.
If councils borrowed at 0% or at a few percent, bankers elsewhere would make less and bonuses would lower. Greed is good, so they say.
@@paulking20391. the dollar is the world's reserve currency, you Muppet.
2. base rate is 5%, not 0%
3. BoE money printing has stuffed the economy, the last thing we need is reckless councils borrowing more printed money that they will never pay back
Because the BoE doesn’t lend at 0%. The current national interest rate is 4.75% - that is the rate at which the BoE can loan to government and council (edit: this increased from historically low rates to slow down inflation)
Because they are privately-owned corporations, listed at Dun & Bradstreet !!!!
Unless they suddenly built millions of houses its impossible. Huge proportions of their budget (often over 50%) is now spent on private rents for often ex council houses. Problem with thatcherism was eventually it runs out of state assets to sell on the cheap.
It sounds like the systems of government should evolve to match the evolved economic situation 😂
They never reinvested all the money they made when they sold of all the council housing back into building more council houses thats the problem
@IRGodful that is they have been forced to do, but that's either more expensive for the government or less services for the people, the tories chose the latter, and Labour seem to be choosing the former
@@Peter-je6td Weren't there literally rules against doing so?
or force bad and low standard housing to sell t them at very low price n fix them n start bringing in rent
Councils main spending is on housing for vulnerable people. They have to pay private landlords humungous rents to be able to do this. If only they had some property of their own that they could use for this purpose. They could call them council houses... lol
The main spending goes on illegal immigrants..
@@terrymorton9941 any proof terry?
@@terrymorton9941 most homelessness in the UK are by White Britons, and especially those who refuse to work
@@terrymorton9941 its a good chance because they boosted up the ladder because they don't have savings, generally have kids and will probably have some disability or wife who doesn't speak any English.
@@AdibMurshed52maybe because white people make up 81% of the population 🙄
I work in local government. The amount of waste is unreal.
The council im in takes 1 month to fix one pothole which caves in again in less than 4 weeks - and are clearly being ripped off by contractors
I would interested to know more on how all the waste goes down!
@@shosc16 While that is true, what really creates the cost is the red tape required to fix the pothole. The government and local councils complain about cost but add laborious, unnecessary regulation where it's not needed.
@@SaintGerbilUK What regulations are unnecessary, in this context? Can you name some and explain why they're not needed?
Examples would help...
Red tape is a big problem. I work for the local council, and have offered to do a simple job such as replace broken locks for the public toilets where i work as the local beach warden. Their answer is no, they need to hire someone for that..... i ask why? Iv the tools, jst say yes and its done, and itl not cost them anything. Again answer is know because "reasons are various" ...still havent fixed the public toielts where both male and female toilets do NOT LOCK
Wow a beach warden and expert on local government finance
@@jontalbot1is he wrong though? there are plenty of examples from other people who actually budget/use the uk’s finances who also agree that we have stifling amounts of bureaucracy
Local councils need changing (IE:Fired) They ALL seem to be running us into the ground, making up stupid rules and blocking even local citizens from fixing things for cheap or free. They are power-mad mini-dictators. Imagine refusing new business or people building anything because one or two people said it would "spoil their view".
@@jontalbot1 The local bureaucracy invents an excuse why something cannot be done and this excuse is used to demand more funding from the government.
@@jontalbot1 rather dismissive, not sure that attitude will help anyone particularly!
I worked in the Housing Dept at Edinburgh Council for 4 years. Even in my entry level job, this sort of problem was recurrent. In order for all council money to be traceable the level of bureaucracy is incredibly high, and processes are arduous. There must be protocols followed in order for everything to adhere to legislation. The rules are strict and the money is tight, no wonder it's slow.
Councils too busy spending 15%-20% of their budgets on private landlords for temporary and emergency accomodation because of the shortage of social housing. I'll leave it others to speculate as to why there's a shortage in the first place.
I've read that 90% of housing problems (shortages) wouldn't exist if not for mass immigration
Council: let's sell our housing stock to pay higher rents to private landlords.
@@AnthonyT142 Councils didn't have a choice about selling their housing stock. When Thatcher introduced right to buy in the 1980s they had to sell their housing stock to the tenants at a huge discount if the tenant wanted to buy. And even if they'd been able to use the money from those sales to build new houses they would have been building them at a loss when the new tenants decided they wanted to buy.
The whole council system needs an overhaul. Money is being spent in the worst ways possible. They are inherently inefficient with too many line managers and not enough ground crew.
As someone who works as an independant professional for a local government, can I add that this was a very clear and concise summary of the situation. We are all hoping so desperately that the new national government can focus sooner rather than later on the local governments. I know it's more money thrown at a seeming money pit, but it's not frivolous spending, it's core services. Adult Social Care is on its knees at the moment, with even legally required services being cut right back. We need this multi-year approach fast!
There are many examples of frivolous spending.
@@alistairmonro Please elaborate, I'd like to learn more.
@@alistairmonroperhaps naming some would help. We need more local consultation, before schemes go ahead, which means we need more people to engage with their council. They are up against apathy, in their defence.
@@alistairmonro There absolutely have been in many cases, certainly where they've set up companies or in cases like Birmingham, but right now, with most the various councils, they weren't free spending. But now they, including my own, which is classed as a "well-run" council, as it has no projects or mad lottery schemes, are broke. There is no money to spend on social care, essential services, etc., so it's not a request for more money to burn, it's more money to keep people alive.
Yes, poor people need to be punished and stretched further to councils and can have gold plated pensions and pay extortionate salaries to employees. You know instead of trim the fat.
Stop funding wars start funding citizens
I agree with this.
Nooo way. Government mismanagement of the budget. I’m truly shocked
lol have you even listened to what they say in the video?
Our council is closing schools!!We’ve already had a raise each year of council tax. We’ve just had one of 5%. Business rent has gone up. We’ve been given an uplift by government, but we are still struggling…
Demographics mean that schools will be closing due too lack of children.
It is mad how much tax people pay in the UK for things to still not work.
Always a new mosque or loads of Muslims renovating their houses though eh? Weird. Almost like they don’t pay council tax like the rest of us have to.
In my opinion we’re paying more however getting less
@@Tom_murray89 you are, did you not watch the bit about all the old people and children in care.
For all the hardships faced by local authorities, they are also HORRIBLY run and are absurdly inefficient in so many ways
As someone thats been illegally living in a commercial warehouse for the last 7 months cause my income doesn't pay me enough to afford Rent and Council Tax.
I'd like to personally admit this was probably my fault. Sorry
It's really cold in here at night though.
The amount councils pay private contractors for things like IT it is no wonder they're going under. Southampton City Council were paying an IT consultant £800 a day to build their system that didn't even work.
No wonder if they were only paying £800 a day. That is far far below market rate, especially if done through an agency and half what would be paid if it was a consultancy company supplying the contractor.
That will be the cheapest option. If it was cheaper to do it themselves, they would do it
That is ridiculously cheap
@@johnpower29Astronomical cheap 😂 I would do it for 1k per month and guarantee it will gone work. 800£ per day is just corrupt councils games. Consulting about projects usually is free because communication is necessary to even understand and build anything 😂
@@THETRUTHISOUTTHERE-m9v No, you wouldn't do it for 1K a month, that would be £5.76 per hour assuming a 40 hour work week. Minimum wage is £11.44. Wages for a software engineer start around £17 per hour and only go upwards depending on experience.
I work at Birmingham Council. Things are pretty crazy right now though most people saw some form of disaster coming as we have been struggling to get funding for years. It was especially the 'cap in hand approach' that seems to cause an enormous amount of chaos.
With that being said those of us below the exec and senior level were furious to learn some of the crap that the so called 'leaders' have approved and pushed for over the years leading to the current problems with equal pay and Oracle (which still hasn't been fixed), there has been literally no accountability for those in positions of power as they show up spin some plates for a few years or seagull on a bunch of projects then piss off to their next exec job with BCC on their resume.
It sucks because a lot of the people I work with are in the Council to make the city better and make things better for residents but the cuts and section 114 notice have been devastating and completely hamstring anything we can do to try and improve stuff on the ground, we have and continue to loose officers who have worked at the Council for 30+ years who are leaving for greener pastures or just retiring.
Just makes me sad man this isn't what I joined the Council to see or do.
Everyone's starting to feel it, don't be so hard on yourself.
It's death by a thousand cuts, the nation has been ignoring this looming disaster since the end of WW2, and definitely since the 1980's.
The collapse needs to go full swing before anything gets addressed. I wish I could say we're nearly through the worst of it... We aren't, so prepare your mindset.
It might not be what you signed up to the council for, but there's never any guarantee on what times we see or when.
It's easier to deal with once you accept the reality of it. It will get worse, more things will fall apart, more sorrow and despair will occur, more human suffering, more frustrations.
Once you accept this, it's then a matter of doing what you can until you feel you no longer can. But always know that nothing is permanent, everything changes.
We're just at a point where things are in collapse. It was unavoidable after the loss of empire 100 years ago. Everything since has just been the slow economic death. In another 50 years it will balance out, and we'll be a vassal state of one of the super-continent systems that are forming. Whether that's Europe or America is yet to be seen.
But it won't happen until there's two to three generations on from the miners strikes and the boomer generation. They're too invested in a world that once was, and believe it can come back... Which anyone with any sense can see that it won't.
Once you accept "where" we are. Then it becomes easier to function and take the weight off. It is what it is, and you just do the best you can amongst the systems cascade.
Whatever remains once the collapse reaches it's zenith is then something that can be rebuilt from.
It's not about fixing it all back to a working state. It's now about salvaging what can be salvaged and letting what needs to fall away fall away.
Not an easy thing to come to terms with, but it's currently the only mindset that will prevent false hopes from being continually dashed.
Watch for the minor miracles within the process, and the small saving graces here and there.
Thanks for everything you do! 💚
While I do not see how giving more money to councils will solve anything, councils & government need to think carefully about generating more money using the resources councils have. Central government, for example, pays housing benefit. A large amount of that now goes to private landlords. If councils were to build properties - they could, in theory, receive that money. Successful planning applications could also attract a cash development charge paid by developers to councils - thus incentivising building - and councils could lease out land they own for renewable energy generation. (Apart from the potentially profitable planning permission to put in the renewables). Business rates could be extended to energy generation rates too, the more generated, the more the councils earn. Austerity has had its day - we need effective management in these councils that is enabled by the government.
Maybe just make it easier for people to build houses?
@@allthenewsordeath5772 Bingo… the economic benefit of construction cannot be overstated…. and energy… well, without energy you can do nothing. We need both… incentivise the councils to do both.
@@allthenewsordeath5772it has to be sustainable (design, planning, infra) or people like you will be first to complain about said housing
Sounds like communism to me (I kid, but suggest that and it's exactly what the RW press would call it)
@@allthenewsordeath5772 It's already plenty easy. The problem is that housebuilders won't build "more than the market can absorb" in a given space of time, which is another way of saying they won't build enough to cause prices to go down.
One thing not talked about here is the loss of local businesses, banks, etc. in place of online services, which means that local councils are losing income from business rates and that money is now ending up in central government through corporation tax, etc. (or not at all if the online companies are using various avoidance tactics.)
Just look at the amount of those refusing to pay their council taxes now. Its massive
Seeing the corrupt and incompetent makes it seem understandable.
Councils need to stop selling services to their mates, for extortionate prices, grabbing the back handers, problem solved just make it regulation to publish spending figures and who signed off on them, maybe stop using paper invoices that disappear.
Make Northumbria its' own country, half England, and give the North spending power on the North, rather than inflating London.
Even then London is suffering, boroughs like Croydon go bankrupt nearly every month, the crisis has caught up to London years ago.
london floats the economy of the rest of the country that would make no difference. the issue isn’t the north sending money down south the issue is the rest of the country being so poor it can’t afford to support itself and the government being too scared to invest in the north when it’s pretty much guaranteed to make a return in the south
@@BluePuffyy It's been our problem for a thousand years, a thousand years of harrying, deprivation, serfdom, industrialisation, "renewal" and "levelling up"
Even the old Labour party, a Northern and Scottish ideal, has been taken over and corrupted by Centre-Right Red Tories, with their crocodile smiles as they desecrate the Red Flag.
I keep it flying here. Red _and_ Yellow. The colours of our North.
This!
@@BluePuffyy Even still, using funds set aside for "Levelling up" the "Northern Powerhouse" on London and the South is outright scandalous.
The south always takes, it never gives.
Give me my country.
They need to stop spending the money on rubbish and don't say they don't.
It's laughable that councils can afford to pay out gold plated pension schemes i.e. defined benefits pensions (rather than normal pensions what everyone gets in private sector).
👏👏👏
Business rates are killing shops. It’s a ridiculous way to fund your social services. Just nationalise the cost of the councils, why are we relying on these little feifdom tax collectors?
Hilarious!
The government can't just magically conjure up the money either (at least not without causing inflation that will hurt consumer spending and thus hurt shops even more). So if the councils are abolished, you would instead need a national tax to fund the social services. You would get roughly the same tax burden, just the organization of how it's done would change.
The current local government system was introduced by Thatcher to, essentially, shield central governments from the effects of her policies. It works so easily. Family friend was a local counselor, and after 2010 the number of people who just would not accept "they cut our budget by 50%" as a reason services were worse was insane.
because then those of us in rural areas become overpayers towards the cost of the cities.
@@accountnamewithheld The opposite is true since it is much more expensive to supply services in rural areas but you carry on feeling victimized. It’s fashionable right now
As someone who has lived for a long time both in and out of the UK, it is disappointing to not see many of the structural causes of council bankruptcy being addressed. City councils have been shaped in times of peak suburbanite car use - where planning laws restrict housing to happen at low density in sprawling expansions around the cities. Building and maintaining infrastructure and services (especially car infrastructure, water and electrical distribution, waste management) becomes extremely expensive and unsustainable in this sprawling scale. This is a known problem that is ever impoverishing USA's suburbs (even more extremely than in the UK). There are two solutions:
1-Re-densify productive centres in a modern, planned way, by bringing housing and business back into cities, and thus more tax money to be spent in a smaller area (Scottish Government is well on its way on implementing this strategy)
2-Divide councils, so that economically productive centres can spend it on themselves, without having to subsidise the suburban Sprawl. This is an effective, yet cruel approach - because if the populations that live in suburbs actually had to pay the infrastructure costs of where they live, they would be LEAGUES away from being able to afford it.
Councils are having to face the consequences of development practices from a time where there was no sustainable sensibility to land use financing. Back then, if it was cheap to build somewhere, then surely you should, not ever thinking of how the development would be maintained in the future.
It's much less of a problem in the UK to be fair. New high-rise apartment buildings are being constructed pretty frequently, and with the decline in foreign university attendance, a lot of what universities have built recently is only seeing a fraction of occupants. That stuff could probably be sold to councils at a steep discount and much of it would be able to be used as council housing without needing much alteration.
The other problem is consumer demand though. Flats are associated with students, young professionals, and poor people. There aren't many in this country that are fit for families or aimed at a higher income middle age demographic, because it wouldn't sell. People prefer living in a sprawlhouse because that's been an image of independence and success for so long, even though it means long travel times, high fuel costs and expensive mortgages.
Stop illegal migrants. 🤔
Import the 3 world become the 3 world
I work in local government in adult and children’s social care, and it’s really bad. I’ve had to make cuts that reduce support for each claimant by up to £16k per year. This funding is meant to cover essential services like social work, caregiving-everything-and the money just isn’t there. It’s heartbreaking to tell a family that their father or child can’t get the support they need, even though we initially said it would happen.
For those who say, "I work in local government, and the amount of waste is unreal," you must not be working anywhere near me or just not working in local government, because here, everything is already cut to the bone.
I don’t believe for the moment they do. It’s just repeating what they think is common sense
If Birmingham can overspend 80m on an IT project I'd suspect there is quite a lot of waste. I guess this won't happen everywhere but there's some shocking examples out there. My local council has just approved a section of road to be built. It's costing £17.3 Million and is about 400m long, or £42,000/meter.
Madness
@@zirconblue2 It’s not madness. Roads are expensive to build, not just in Brum but anywhere
@@jontalbot1 £43M / kilometer ( £69Million / mile) isn't just expensive it's a ridiculous fee. If we really accept these sorts of figures there's no helping us.
The average earner pays around £8.3k in income tax, so that 400m stretch of road consumed the entire income tax take of more than 2000 people for an entire year. It's a joke
@@zirconblue2 Where are you getting your figures from?
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this is definitely considerable! think you could suggest any professional/advisors i can get on the phone with? i'm in dire need of proper portfolio allocation
Jennafer Beaver Turner is the licensed advisor I use.
Just research the name. You'd find necessary details to work with to set up an appointment
Thanks, I looked her up on Google and was very impressed by her credentials. I reached out because I need all the help I can get. I've scheduled a phone call with her.
I read the cover of the video as "Can Starmer STARVE councils" instead of "save" and I think that my misreading was correct
Council's being bankrupt isn't new, and an increase in government funding isn't a bad thing. But labour need to reclaim the money that was unjustly palmed off to tory doners. As well as a shift to keynesian style economics. (or post Keynesian)
But it is new as it only happened twice before 2000
@@charliesmith5783 alright it's not "new" in the grand scheme of things. But it is old news, since it's been happening for years.
Because everyone seems too scared to even mention the word immigrants, let’s all appreciate how our open boarder love everyone policy is now making everyone worse off than ever….
Immigration is national level issue though.
The problem with councils and mp's is that there is no accountability for their spending, if there was then you can bet councils won't be wasting money on silly projects
And if we’re spending less & less on European contribution, health, education AND council services, where exactly is the money going? …multi-year enquiries into scandals under central government purview amongst other leakages… 🤔
We are not paying contribution to the EU but we are not receiving anything from the EU either anymore. That's why Cornwall is going bust for example.
@Jeevessss The UK isn't too expensive to run, we're just not charging market-rate rents to the finance industry. Raise taxes on the London businesses that are taking advantage of us and running the country becomes affordable.
Where has the 2.77 Trillion pound Dept gone?
Why is all the western countries in Dept?
Where is all the money?
Note how the options for councils never include senior staff being paid less?
Thanks to bureaucracy, it's virtually impossible for councils to fire serially incompetent workers, of course there's no way for them to cut salaries.
In the US, local governments often have referenda for increasing tax for some particular purpose (schools, building a stadium, etc.), and these usually pass. So it's interesting to me that you view this sort of thing as dead-on-arrival in the UK.
In the US, local governments are the main funders of school, which to me is most horrific way I've ever heard of to fund them. Since then poor kids have less money for their education.
The US also has a very high focus on land taxes. Which are actually a good tax, but unusual.
It's incredibly un-even in the UK, the multi-millionaire with a 10 bedroom house gets charged the same amount in council tax as the 1 bed semi-detached down the same road. The poorer couple don't want to pay anymore council tax otherwise they'll be unable to afford the rent, the millionaire doesn't want to pay more tax because he enjoys his holiday's.
Because any extra tax raised goes into the black hole of paying for social care. Nobody would ever see a school or a stadium etc. We pay more and more every year and see less and less for it, with libraries and sports facilities closing down, roads that don't get maintained, etc etc. The video didn't really cover it but over 90% of council spending goes on social care and education. There is very little left to do anything else.
@@Burty117 Ah, I hadn't realized that council tax was regressive in that way. In the US, local government revenue usually comes mostly from sales tax (which is also regressive) and property tax, but property tax is usually calculated as roughly: the current assessed value of your property divided by the total value of all taxable property, multiplied by the total tax levy. So US property tax is very much like a pure wealth tax (though only on real estate).
@@FireEverLiving Yeah technically, Council tax is based on several factors, how many bedrooms, how many people live in said property, and mainly how much the house is worth, unfortunately, those figures are from the 90's, all houses here are worth way more now, so effectively, everyone is on the highest tax bracket.
Councils are inefficient and being blunt too political. They are poor value for money and are are well known to be wasteful.
They aren't. The rules of the game are rigged against councils being as efficient as they could be. Procurement rules are a joke and are not there to get the best value for councils, they are there to protect the interests of suppliers. The red tape that councils have to deal with isn't put in place by the councils, it is put in place by central government and government quangos. Governments won't remove it because that would take away the only advantage the private sector have when it comes to council contracts. i.e. they can compete because they don't have to follow the same red tape rules as the council themselves do. So there is "waste" but it is by design.
a lot of it is down to the austerity and cuts introduced by the tories, they cut funding to labour councils in particular. So many councils did risky business initiatives that didn't workout and they lost money on.
*I'm glad you made this video* it reminds me of my transformation from a nobody to good home, $34k monthly and a good daughter full of love..
I can still remember the exact feeling on my biggest payday in the market. Imagine taking home $407k just from 12k initial deposit. For the newbies I'll encourage anyone to embrace copytrade as the best approach especially when you're a newbie
Huge! been trying to trade on my own for a while now but it isn't going well. Few weeks ago I lost about $10,000 in a particular trade. Can you at least advise me on what to do?
🙏 *12k to 407k is significant increase. My first copytrade wasn't profitable. Please share who you copy trade*
I only copytrade one manager
Coashjenny...that's it💯.
Add a land value tax to get the economy moving, come on
Anything that can go wrong is going wrong.
I think we should stop trying to be a world power and relax.
Reform Council Tax and Business Rates and allow Local Government to raise their own finance minus any limitations from Westminster.
There are two problems with this. First it would reinforce inequality. Raising the same amount of Council tax in Surrey requires a lower level of Council Tax than say Hartlepool. Second, the Treasury likes to have overall control of national spending. Planning the national accounts etc would be very difficult
Councils going bankrupt is a national scandal in the 6th richest nation on earth.
Many of us assumed one of labours first acts would be to increase the funding to councils after massive Tory cuts.
Non of the cuts helped pay off our debts, the debt increased 1.85Trillion under the Tories and left councils on the brink.
Labour babbled on about black holes in the budget, while giving councils just a few beans.
Social care costs from council tax are £4 out of every £5, all other services paid for with the remaining £1 out of £5.
Why are council taxpayers paying for social care ? when it's a national problem.
We have the money for war, but not social care, on Labours head be it in 2029.
The "6th richest" has always bothered me, it's true but the reality for most people (GDP per capita) we are 26th.
Why are the number of children needing care increasing if the birth rate among the British people is sub-replacement?
Neglect
Because immigrants are breeding like rats. Only British people aren't breeding
You already know the answer.
Immigration
Probably because of an increase in poverty. Less people are having kids but the ones that are are suffering more financially from it than before
Instead of basing council tax rates on the (estimated) value of the property in April 1991, why don't we base it on the actual value these days?
yep, Council tax is £2000 a year, £100 in spain.
And the bins are emptied almost daily. Hospitals are clean and efficient. They still have families. Imagine that.
Non Britain here. How much of council houseing is British vs immigrants?
Next year, we're screwed. They will raise council taxs the max they can. And they are scrapping the single persons discount. I'm leaving this country
I work with local councils, I can’t tell you how stupidly inefficient they are. Even if they just stopped funding crack houses, it would be a start.
Please can you tell us more about the crack houses. alternatively I would love to know any other examples of "stupid" inefficiency.
The councils are in trouble because they keep wasting money on Didn't Earn It token employees and vanity projects, instead of on what the council tax is supposed to be spent on.
Councils also make money from investments. The best councils have done this successfully. The worst coumcils have made a mess and lost money pushing them further to 'bankruptcy'
Just why we're are being burdened by "adult social care" then and with so much higher demand? If one hasn't been responsible for their life and prep for their retirement then the natural outcome would be that person won't be able to support the spendings once out of the job market. I appreciate there'd be other factors contribute to ones life events which lead to the outcome, but it kinda feels like we're creating a system to encourage people not be responsible for themselves and tell them there'll be free money for them regardless, pay by all other tax payers. The truth is, at this rate and attitude, there'll never be enough funding for those services, and the country simply has no money to keep going down this route. As brutal as it may sound, people should bear the consequences of their own life decisions rather than keep having the country to pay for their failures indefinitely
Well done lettuce Liz, could have fixed this about 13 times over without that 40 billion loss you gave us. never mind how many times the money lost from Brexit could have relieved this 👏 👏 👏
Councils do not pay it, it is the council tax payers ! Nice pay rise for council staff ! I have worked indirectly with two council’s they have a habit of hiding money!
All I know is that most pensioners pay more in council tax than income tax.
Which is actually reasonable, since they are no longer gaining much income but are still benefiting from council services - usually more than ever.
Stop paying council bosses excessive money.
So true most of them are on 250k +
I lived in Birmingham up until July 24. I couldn't understand how the council allowed weekly bin collections, new speed humps with 20mph signs on a nearby stretch of road, consulting about reducing speed limits on about 25 roads and able to get an environmental health officer to inspect my privately rented property within about a week. Most of these were surprisingly when there are vast changes when I lived in Derby and Sheffield. Both of these areas, at the time, had higher council taxes.
Foreigner council workers giving contracts to their foreigner family/friends maybe.
We all want to pay less tax , but we all still want generous child/poor/ elderly benefits ,better NHS,better roads,better schools ,stronger army ,more generous gov pensions ,more housing (but not in green belts) , no inheritance tax.
And not to send money overseas or spaff it up the wall on net zero policies 😂
I don't want most of that... just lower taxes thanks...
The native British population is actually going down by hundreds of thousands every decade due to declining birth rates, I wonder where the strain on public services is coming from?
@@ontheslide2339 which ones are important to you personally? besides lower taxes
@@mangs9940
the roads need work... unless driving becomes prohibited...
Imagine open source iniatives existing and a council spending 80 Million on an IT project... Sounds like a "job for the boys"
Do tell me which open source ERP system they should have chosen instead of SAP?
so the increase in elderly social care has increased significantly but yet we are being told that they dont need winter fuel payments as they are all well off homeowners? kinda contradictory in what is being said by the general media and in this video.
The first thing to do is get Labour out of local councils - non-Labour candidates can’t even get onto the ballot paper at local council elections in Labour stronghold areas - and Labour controlled councils are even joining up with other Labour controlled councils in adjoining areas to protect “safe” Labour council seats, to hold on to power even more tightly
I live in Birmingham. It’s always been bleak but lately it’s unbearable. The decline is extreme.
TLDR should help fund councils more.
Bad investments, inflated wages for councillors, rents to private landlords.
Bonus points for the shot of Nottingham Council building :)
The amount being spent on hotels is extraordinary
Brexit means brexit
you can hear the knuckles dragging, how little do you think oligarchs pay in tax? now look at the cost difference.
@@danielcraig4974 more like the EU sending them here as punishment.
@@AppleAirsoft And the increase in rape rates.
@@AppleAirsoftA country normally has a census to determine the projected growth of a population, then they expand the health services, roads , schools and councils to accommodate the growth or decline . Having open borders means that nothing can be planned for ! All our services are overwhelmed, our infrastructure is overwhelmed, our councils are skint, our public finances are non existent and the government is literally scrambling to find any way they can to generate more money and unique ways to borrow…… while at the same time wages are stagnant and everything is more expensive!
Now explain why that’s knuckle dragging? If I had built a one bedroom house for me and my wife ….. it’s sufficient because we have no kids yet …. But say she got pregnant with triplets….. now that house no longer meats the requirement it was built for !
Need to stop the population explosion for a start!
This vlog misses a critical point in where councils raise revenue from. You list 3 ways, however there is a massive 4th income stream, namely charging for services and impositions of fines. Many councils are generating tens of millions of £s this way. Sadly this revenue stream is ignored by the left. Birmingham is a basket case based with bad management who should be sacked and criminally charged.
People should note including those that created this video, that councils in Wales, England, Scotland and Northern Ireland all have different rules and regulations. Business rates in Wales for example don't go to councils, and Welsh councils can increase council tax without referendums.
Why do we have to pay council tax its a joke. I pay 2k for my bins to be collected, why shoukd i pay to care for elderly or abandoned kids?
How timely, I was just wondering earlier today whether any other councils had gone bankrupt
Local Government Reform Please
You fail to mention here that the localism act only applies to England. Welsh councils have raised council tax more than 5% in the past few years. The minister for local government and housing in the welsh government can cap any rise but have decided not to.
Family breakdown is the root cause of so much of the social care bill. We need stronger families who look after each other
Lets remember we spend £1.3 billion yearly on asylum seekers. But of course lets get taxed more.
And the billionaires that control the government?
Jeremy corbyn came close
You've not directly called out the minimum wage increase and national insurance rate rise. These two factors will massively increase the burden on council spending. On the one hand, dirictly affecting local government employees. But also private sector companies providing services paid for by councils, such as nursing homes and childcare centres. This budget will not be relief to councils, it will squeeze them harder than before.
The problem as I see it is that social care requires ever increasing resources but as these are statutory services that must be provided, the only way councils can fund these is by cutting back more and more on the things that people think they pay their council tax for - bins, parks, libraries etc.
This creates a situation whereby people feel like they pay more for ever decreasing services.
I'm not saying councils should cut social care but central gov should recognise this and fund it separately to other council areas.
Some council have stopped the single person discount so they’ve put it up 25% for those people technically
Either they can fund social care - or they can give councils more money to fund social care.
Similarly they can fund temporary accommodation - or they can give councils more money to fund temporary accommodation.
These are the ONLY two things that are bankrupting councils, and both are not the fault of local government. It's out of their hands. Shoveling someone else's stables.
Simple.
ISN'T ENOUGH!? Why is spending so high, spend without your means, government too. If you can't afford you can't afford.
This is utterly ridiculous, if a business was to operate like this it would collapse. These council have almost guaranteed income.
I think councils need to be run more like a business. The mindset of having guaranteed income vs not working for the money makes a huge difference in people's approach. If you know you're getting the money then you don't really care whereas from a business point of view your more conservative with the way money in spent. An £80mil overspend is shocking. These council have finance people to advise them, they should all get fired and if this is happening across the board they need to hire business man to run the council.
A good start in Birmingham would to be reduce the number of Councillors!
There are 92! If you live in UK, you might think that’s OK.
Auckland Council has a mayor and 20 Councillors, and has a similar population to Birmingham.
Elderly care and State care for children, however, is provided by Central Government.
For those who can afford it, the elderly pay for private care, with a cut off eligibility of a certain amount of money and property.
This becomes a little more complicated if one of a couple has to go into care because their health needs cannot be catered for in the family home.
The same problem is arising all round the globe with a large cohort of people reaching retirement age, the wave of which will take at least 20 years to pass.
Many Councils have a 4th source of income that can be significant. Fees and Charges for a range of services such as car parking, commercial property rentals, markets, sports pitches, burials and cremations, even ports and airports. Plainly this source of income is not something that can be dialled up in the short-term. It requires a very long-term policy by the local authority but I have worked for several councils where it has been a larger source of income than Council Tax on domestic premises. Newcastle under Lyme and Portsmouth used to be exemplars.
So basically Labour are just doing what the Tories did? Drip feed some extra money in and say be thankful...
I should have thot what they really need is support eg. experts in procurement for specialist services IT systems
Councils do for big IT projects. The first tender that goes out is for a consultancy to help them draft the requirements specification and to assist them in choosing a supplier to implement said big project.
US municipal governments rarely go bankrupt (Chapter 9), so what is the US and it’s municipalities doing, to where municipal bankruptcy is fairly rare, but it feels more acute in the UK? Since 1988, at least 28 municipalities and counties have filed for Chapter 9, ranging from a small town like Moffet, OK (pop. 160), to places like Detroit, and Orange County, CA. 15 of those did happen from 2007 until 2013, due in large part to the Great Recession
Who was the 15% who voted for council tax rises in Bedfordshire?
The ones that don't pay it but get a free kitchen remodel on the councils dime
I ran for councilor 3 days ago for liberal Democrats in Scotland.
I lost.
I will run again in 2 years. I am 24yrs old. I am... Concerned over the future of local councils wnd the public
Good video, even if councils don't S114, they are unable to deliver decent services. People are fed up with poor services, and don't understand how much funding has been cut in the last decade.
Business rates is the most unfair tax - pay the council for opening business - how does that make sense
it dose not help when you have major councils merge like Bournemouth Christchurch and Poole who then lose all the savings and have spent them before the paint on the new logo dries.
Why do I have to pay council tax when I never signed a contract with them?
A single naughty child who needed placement could potentially cost a council £1 million quid annually. So do the math. If you only had 500 of them in a single local authority. They are effectively bankrupt.
So much housing benefit money goes directly to landlords and they run schemes on how to maximise profits by dividing houses into HMOs and charging max per room meaning less houses for families and higher rents everywhere
Why are foreigners in hotels or our council houses whilst our own are sleeping rough on the streets when their ancestors paid for these council houses through their rents.Are we all backwards.