A council leader has accused central government of failing to listen to local authorities once again over the significant pressures they face to balance their books.

Leader of Medway Council Vince Maple (Lab) has claimed the increase in funding announced yesterday to help struggling town halls of all political colours amounted to “no support at all”.

It comes after Michael Gove’s Department of Levelling Up, Housing, and Communities revealed councils will see a 6.5% rise in the cash they get from Westminster.

The provisional local government settlement, which sets out how much local authorities get each financial year, will increase higher than inflation for the 2024/25 financial year.

However, it’s not as substantial as the 9.4% increase given for 2023/24.

Medway Council faces a £12 million overspend it has to tackle before February when it sets its budget for next year.

The newly Labour controlled administration has repeatedly said it needs greater action from the government as financial pressures mount.

In October, the authority agreed to write to Chancellor Jeremy Hunt to ask for more money in the Autumn Statement, insisting the costs of adult and children’s social care were putting an unsustainable burden on local councils.

But this request went unheeded as the autumn statement failed to bring in more cash for local government.

Medway council leader Cllr Maple says the problems affect councils of all political colours and types and yesterday’s provisional settlement did little to alleviate these concerns.

He added: “The government had the opportunity to listen carefully to local government, both here in Medway and across the country.

“Never before have we had such a cross-party consensus in a message to say local government needs support and I think over the next few months you’ll continue to see well-run councils who haven’t made bad decisions, they’ve just got more demand than they’ve got money and the resources coming in just doesn’t meet the needs.

“I know that my Conservative counterparts in KCC Peter Oakford and Roger Gough are incredibly angry, so this is not a party political row.

All councils regardless of their colour rosette are saying ‘you could and should have done more and you haven’t’

“All councils regardless of their colour rosette are saying ‘you could and should have done more and you haven’t’.

“It’s becoming increasingly clear with both the autumn statement and the local government provisional settlement that they’re simply not listening.”

Kent County Council’s leader Cllr Roger Gough (Con) also called the funding announcement “disappointing” and said that it put the county-wide authority in an “unsustainable financial position”.

The Local Government Association (LGA), a cross-party organisation that represents local councils as a whole, said the government needed to come up with a long-term plan urgently to avoid a growing crisis.

Cllr Shaun Davies, chair of the LGA, said: “Today’s settlement does not provide enough funding to meet the severe cost and demand pressures which have left councils of all political colours and types warning of the serious challenges they face to set balanced budgets next year.

“The funding uplift announced by the Government today assumes that all councils will increase their council tax bills by the maximum allowed in 2024/25.

“This means councils are again left facing the difficult choice about raising bills to bring in desperately needed funding.

“The government urgently needs to address the growing financial crisis facing councils and come up with a long-term plan to sufficiently fund local services through multi-year settlements.”

It comes after the LGA found one in five councils are likely to issue Section 114 notices - an effective admission of bankruptcy which subjects them to central government control - in the next two years.

Meanwhile, Cllr Maple said portfolio holders and officers were working hard to avoid such a scenario for the Towns.

He added: “The settlement does nothing new to support us. We know the pressures in adult social care are increasing because of the complexity of cases, the number of cases - it’s demand driven - we can’t stop people needing social care.

“People know we’ve already taken some difficult decisions, regrettably we’ll have more of those to take between now and when we set the budget in February.

“We’ve taken the decision to bring in CIPFA [Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy] to work with us, the sector leaders in local government finance.

“That work is nearly completed now and we’ll be looking carefully at their recommendations.”

CIPFA were invited in by Medway Council to look for ways to make efficiencies and savings in November in order to reduce the predicted £12 million shortfall.

Cllr Maple said that although there would have to be difficult decisions, there were positives as pressures were being eased by an increase in the numbers of people using council-run facilities like gyms and leisure centres.

The provisional settlement will go out for consultation and a final decision will be made on January 15 about the amount of money councils will get.

Cllr Maple says the authority will be lobbying for more cash.

“We’ll be making very strong representations to say this settlement does not hit the mark and I hope, even though it doesn’t feel like they’ve listened to date, they might start listening in the new year,” he said.

“These are not circumstances that were asking for additional funding for non-essential projects, this is for adult social care, for tackling homelessness, for transport, and for our most vulnerable children.

“If Michael Gove doesn’t think those are a priority, I’d ask what is? What is a priority if those things aren’t?”

Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove said: “Councils are the backbone of their communities and carry out tremendous work every day in delivering vital services to the people they serve.

“We recognise they are facing challenges and that is why we have announced a £64 billion funding package to ensure they can continue making a difference, including through our combined efforts to level up.”