Government told to stop ‘unfairness’ towards Cornwall
The leader and deputy leader of Cornwall Council have written to the Government challenging a Westminster decision to strip ‘remoteness’ out of the local government Fair Funding Review.
The council’s Liberal Democrat leader Cllr Leigh Frost and its Independent deputy leader Cllr Adam Paynter have written to the Minister for Local Government Alison McGovern MP saying the revised approach “bakes in the same old unfairness, leaving Cornwall facing a net loss of £3.6 million and a staggering £37.5 million swing away from where we should rightfully be”.
Cornwall Council’s ruling administrations – whether Conservative or the new Lib Dem / Independent cabinet – have long demanded that the Government looks more kindly on Cornwall when it comes to local government funding.
Cllr Frost has pointed out that Cornwall is one of the most sparsely populated regions in the country and its geography means services cost significantly more to deliver. “From children’s social care to collecting waste, remoteness matters. It has real-world costs,” he argued.
“Removing this factor doesn’t make those costs disappear, it just means Cornwall is expected to shoulder them alone. We are standing up for Cornwall and demanding Government restores the funding formula that recognises the true cost of delivering public services in rural and coastal communities.”
Sharing the letter on social media, Conservative councillor James Mustoe said: “Fair play to Leigh and Adam, I am sure their stand will have support from all political parties.”
Below is the full letter:
Dear Minister,
On behalf of the people of Cornwall and politicians of all parties we write to you again, this time with far greater concern than expressed in our first letter of October 9 when we respectfully asked that the Fair Funding Review 2.0 (FFR2.0) proposals be implemented without amendment.
The reason for making that request was of fundamental importance – FFR2.0 as proposed would have finally provided a settlement that recognises the true cost (as we evidenced) of providing council services across one of the Cornwall.
In your response dated November 27 you make reference to “…making good on long-overdue promises fundamentally update the way we fund local authorities, realigning funding with need and deprivation”. That was entirely true of the FFR2.0 proposal, but sadly not the policy statement as a result of the near wholesale removal of remoteness from the ‘need’ element of the formula.
Our independently verified figures reveal the dramatic and devastating swing away from the prospect of fairer funding to a continuation of unfair funding for Cornwall.
Following the June consultation, we were forecasting that Cornwall would gain overall by about £57m. Our forecast has now reduced to a net loss of about £3.6m, with £37.5m of the adverse swing due to the removal of remoteness from the RNFs Relative Needs Formulae for funding certain services for all but adult social care.
Looking at both the IFS Institute for Fiscal Studies peer review of the FFR2.0 proposals and MHCLG’s Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government response to the consultation, particularly regarding remoteness, there are clearly more responses in support of the proposal than against.
Likewise, more responses appeared to cite specific examples and evidence of remoteness than those that opposed the proposal “…largely on the grounds that there is insufficient evidence to support its inclusion”. We respectfully ask how many of those contrary ‘grounds’ were evidenced and can those be shared with the council.
We are more than happy to provide even more compelling evidence of the additional costs associated with extreme remoteness, given the council provides the broadest range of services across one of the least densely populated and poorest regions in the country.
While it’s pleasing to see remoteness has been retained in recognition of providing adult social care to individuals in their own homes, the same households are having their refuse collected and are reliant on other statutory services provided by the council at a similar higher cost.
Cornwall’s geographic isolation and dispersed population means ‘remoteness’ is also a defining and dominant cost factor across all our services, particularly in attracting and sustaining competitive supplier markets.
These circumstances are particularly acute in children’s social care where limited provider competition has created a market dynamic that allows suppliers to ‘cherry-pick’ packages, resulting in Cornish children being placed in supported residential accommodation out of Cornwall and at extortionate additional cost.
Before the prospect of finally securing fairer funding for Cornwall evaporates as a result of the changes made to FFR2.0 version of the formula, we implore you to consider the exceptional nature of the region, characterised by the combination of extreme sparsity and high levels of poverty.
We would point to the 2025 IMD which ranks Cornwall as the 31st most deprived area in respect of the ‘access to housing and services’ domain. That is the context in which the council is operating within and attempting to mitigate.
In the circumstances we implore you to restore the full remoteness adjustment to the formula as proposed in June. If that isn’t possible, we would respectfully ask that a Remoteness Grant of £37.5m be provided to the council as part of our Local Government Settlement; akin to the continuing Recovery Grant, where funding is being made available separate to the formula.
We are aware that our six Members of Parliament share our concerns and hope your dialogue with Jayne Kirkham MP restores the much-needed and justified fairer funding settlement for Cornwall.