Council leaders slam Chancellor for ‘blatant unfairness’ over £4.8 billion levelling up fund

Council tax payers will have to cough up extra and community groups will get less funding if the Government sticks by its decision to divert cash away from some of the poorest areas in the country.

Lewisham, Lambeth, Southwark and Greenwich have all been named by City Hall as boroughs with high levels of poverty but will not receive any support from the Government’s £4.8 billion ‘levelling up fund’.

The funding, announced in the Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s budget last week, is supposed to help the UK’s most deprived areas to “level up” but only identified Newham and Barking and Dagenham as priority boroughs in London.

Several more affluent areas outside the capital were also named, including Sunak’s constituency of Richmond in Yorkshire – despite being ranked as 256th poorest authority district.

Cllr Jack Hopkins, Leader of Lambeth Council said: “We are staggered that a so-called Levelling Up Fund has ignored some of the most deprived areas in the country and we have written to the Chancellor alongside other London councils to demand answers.

“While Rishi Sunak’s constituency has received funding despite not being in the top 250 most deprived areas, inner London councils have been excluded.

“Sadly, after receiving no funding to address disparities in the vaccine roll-out despite being one of the most diverse boroughs in the country, and after a decade of government cuts that disproportionately hit the poorest areas hardest, we are no longer surprised when the government does this.

“But our communities deserve much better and they deserve a government that cares about genuinely levelling up all parts of our country.”

Out of Englands 533 constituencies, Sunak’s constituency of Richmond ranked as the 256th most deprived, along with the Conservative constituency of Derbyshire Dales, at 265th – but both are classed as priority one areas.

12 London boroughs, including Lewisham, Lambeth, Southwark and Greenwich, all rank amongst the third most deprived areas of England but were snubbed by the Chancellor.

Council leaders from the 12 boroughs have written to the Chancellor to express their concern and request that the government clarify why their boroughs have been overlooked.

The letter, signed by the council leaders, demanded “transparency” from the Treasury and criticised the Government for over “10 years of Government austerity” that “has seen our core budgets slashed by more than half”.

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan has also hit out at what he has called the “blatant unfairness” and urged the Government to “come clean” about how it decided where money should go.

Councillor Danny Thorpe, Leader of the Royal Borough of Greenwich said:”We are extremely disappointed that the Government has excluded Royal Greenwich from its Levelling Up Prospectus, given that even pre-pandemic almost a third of our residents were living in communities ranked in England’s 20 per cent most income deprived.

“Our borough is already suffering the effects of a decade’s worth of under-investment, with the amount of money we receive from government having reduced significantly since 2010.

“This means that we are facing an estimated £150m pressure on our budgets – that’s over £1,000 per household – a situation that has gone from bad to worse as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

“That City Hall has named Royal Greenwich as one of the boroughs most in need of financial aid is no surprise to us, however what is shocking that the government is ignoring some of the country’s poorest areas while claiming to be helping those most in need.

“This decision is both perverse and grossly unfair, and is clearly not based in reality.

“If the Government is truly committed to the cause of Levelling Up after the nightmare of the past year, it must give areas most in need like Royal Greenwich priority, or at the very least explain its reasons for deciding to do otherwise.

“We therefore echo the call of London Mayor Sadiq Khan for Ministers to reveal the criteria by which this decision was made.”

The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government and the Department for Transport have said they will publish further technical details about the funds shortly – but funding will be “allocated competitively”.

A HM Treasury spokesman said: “All local areas in the UK will be able to apply for funding through the levelling up fund.

“The bandings do not represent eligibility criteria – and money will be allocated to the areas most in need.

“Further technical details will be published by the government in due course.”