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Based on a recent survey of municipal councils, UK councils are preparing to offload social clubs, athletic facilities, and retail spaces as they bet on a fire sale of assets to balance the books.

Growing Financial Pressures Drive Asset Sales

The Key Cities Group for second-tier cities in the UK stated that six out of ten of councils are planning to sell assets to cover the rising costs of adult and children’s social care.

Councils have previously come under fire for disposing of public land and land to support their budgets, but they argue they must continue to raise vital cash from asset sales or face insolvency.

The group said that a high proportion of councils seeking to raise money from a fire sale of assets marked “a distinct shift from 2024, when the largest share (60%) of municipal officials said they would prioritise service redesigns and using savings to weather increasing fiscal pressures.”

Detailed Examples of Planned Disposals

Medway Council in southeast England said its asset disposal plan featured the sale of a retail complex in Rainham and a community venue in Rochester to raise £20m over five years.

• Gillingham golf club and commercial properties owned in two English counties, which all generate rent for Medway council, will additionally be sold under the plan.

Council Tax Rises and Broader Fiscal Pressures

The survey of local authorities in the coalition, which covers Sunderland, Southampton, Gloucester and Salford, also found that over seven in ten of councils will have to increase council taxes next spring to address the growing cost of essential services, higher levels of housing insecurity, and a persistent accommodation deficit.

Medway council said it will proceed with property disposals after steep rises in the cost of children services, special educational needs and disability (Send) provision, elderly and disability services, and short-term housing.

“We are adopting innovative approaches but some of these take time to deliver both better provisions and financial savings,” stated a council leader.

He continued: “We face demographic pressures which will persist to add to the strains we have. As a local government body, we had a 91% cut in our revenue support grant from 2010-24, which is very challenging.”

Countrywide Trends and Forecasts

Research of county councils recently also found council budgets being stretched by the increasing figures of children and adults requiring Send support.

The County Councils Network projected that council deficits will hit 4.4 billion pounds a year by 2029, as they grapple to manage increased demand.

Government officials have put off scheduled changes to the special educational needs framework until next year after a white paper outlining those changes has been postponed.

Disadvantage and Financial Shortfalls

Based on the latest deprivation measures (IMD) covering English councils, many participating urban areas were among the most deprived in England.

• “Member cities like Hull, Bradford, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Wolverhampton rank in the top 30 nationally under the 2025 deprivation indices,” said the report.

“Although only a single urban area is in the ten most deprived for deprived neighbourhoods countrywide, cities are much more prone to be in the worst-off 20% of England. The data underscores the scale of challenges facing local leaders across major urban centers in the next twelve months,” the report concluded.

“Council officials have been clear about the necessity for a fair and sustainable funding system that reflects and addresses the real levels of deprivation and demand,” said Michael Mordey.

“Without this, councils will continue to face impossible choices around which essential services to fund, and which to reduce, to the detriment of their residents.”

One in five of councils have reduced or weakened social care provision in the last year, the survey found.