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According to a new survey of local authorities, UK councils are planning to sell community centers, sports centres, and shopping arcades as they bet on a fire sale of assets to balance the books.

Increasing Financial Pressures Prompt Asset Sales

The Key Cities Group for second-tier cities in England stated that 60% of local authorities are planning to sell assets to cover the escalating costs of adult and children’s social care.

Local governments have in the past come under fire for disposing of playing fields and land to support their finances, but they contend they must continue to raise vital cash from asset sales or face insolvency.

The group said that a significant number of authorities seeking to generate funds from a fire sale of assets marked “a clear change from 2024, when the majority (six in ten) of municipal officials said they would focus on restructuring services and using savings to weather growing fiscal pressures.”

Specific Examples of Planned Sales

One local authority in Kent announced its asset disposal plan featured the disposal of a shopping centre in Rainham and a social club in Rochester to generate 20 million pounds over five years.

• A local golf course and commercial properties owned in two English counties, which all generate rent for Medway council, will also be disposed of under the strategy.

Local Levy Rises and Wider Financial Pressures

This research of local authorities in the coalition, which covers several urban centers, also found that over seven in ten of authorities will have to raise local levies next spring to cover the growing cost of essential services, higher levels of housing insecurity, and a longstanding accommodation deficit.

Medway council said it will proceed with asset sales 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 creative strategies but some of these require time to deliver both improved services and financial savings,” said a council leader.

He continued: “We face population challenges which will continue to add to the strains we have. As a unitary authority, we had a 91% cut in our revenue support grant from over the past decade, which is very challenging.”

Countrywide Trends and Projections

A survey of county councils this week also found council budgets being strained by the increasing figures of children and older individuals needing special educational assistance.

The County Councils Network projected that council deficits will hit £4.4bn a year by the end of the decade, as they struggle to cope with rising needs.

Government officials have put off scheduled changes to the Send system until next year after a white paper setting out those reforms was recently delayed.

Deprivation and Funding Gaps

Based on the most recent indices of deprivation (the Index of Multiple Deprivation) for English councils, several participating urban areas were among the most deprived in England.

• “Participating urban centers like Hull, Bradford, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Wolverhampton place in the top 30 nationally under the 2025 IMD measures,” noted the report.

“Although only one key city is in the ten most deprived for disadvantaged communities countrywide, cities are far more likely to be in the worst-off 20% of England. The figures underscores the extent of challenges confronting municipal officials across key cities in the coming year,” the analysis added.

“Council officials have been explicit about the need for a fair and sustainable funding system that accounts for and responds to the actual extent of disadvantage and need,” stated Michael Mordey.

“Lacking this, councils will persist to face impossible choices around which vital provisions to allocate spend to, and which to reduce, to the detriment of their communities.”

A fifth of councils have reduced or weakened social care provision in the last year, the study revealed.