inews has reported that ‘Whoever becomes Prime Minister next month will have to increase spending on public services by even more than has been pledged by either Labour or the Conservatives,’ according to a new report. 

Joint analysis by the Institute for Government and the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) shows that demand on critical public services like police, schools and hospitals will rise.

Rob Whiteman, chief executive of CIPFA, said: “It is simply impossible to make good spending decisions without understanding how service performance is affected.

"Yet despite overwhelming evidence that service performance is declining across the board, government continues to make short term spending decisions that do nothing to ease growing demand pressures on public services.  With a general election on the way we would urge the new government, whichever it may be, to fundamentally rethink how public services are funded with a focus on long term sustainability.”

The Rural Services Network has long campaigned for fairer funding for rural areas who have historically been underfunded when compared to urban areas.  From 2011-2017, revenue funding to pay for local authority services was reduced by £16 billion, forcing the sector to make uncomfortable cutbacks which impact negatively on the quality of residents lives.  Those impacts have particularly been felt by rural residents, as their local authorities had below average levels of funding to start with.

The RSN is calling on Government to produce a comprehensive Rural Strategy to address the range of challenges facing those in rural areas.  

For more information visit www.rsnonline.org.uk/time-for-a-rural-strategy

Full news article:

inews - Next Prime Minister should spend even more money on schools and hospitals to meet needs, report says