By Richard Johnstonein Brighton | 26 September 2013
Labour leader Ed Miliband has said he is ‘fearful’ about the impact government cuts are having on councils, but warned the party will not able to provide ‘easy answers’ on reversing reductions.
During a question and answer session at the Labour party conference yesterday, Miliband was asked what he would do to tackle the blackhole faced in council finances. He answered that a review of all public spending was needed.
‘I know the way that local government has been decimated by this government,’ he told delegates.
‘We’ve got a whole review going on across the whole of public spending to look at how we shape that spending into Labour priorities rather than Conservative priorities.’
Among the programmes being taken forward is the party’s local government taskforce inquiry, examining how public services can be restructured to better meet the needs of local areas.
Miliband said this work would continue up to the next general election in 2015. ‘I’m very fearful, as you are, about what’s being done in local government but we have to do the work before we get into government, and indeed once we get into government, to look at how we spend money better.’ However, he added: ‘I can’t promise easy answers.’
Also in yesterday’s session, Miliband said Labour's housing policy commission, which was announced at the conference and will be led by former council chief executive Sir Michael Lyons, would look at how to boost council housing.
The Labour leader said he didn’t think there’s a solution to the problems we face in terms of our housing unless we have housing in every sector being built – council housing, housing association housing, private and affordable housing’.
The scale of the challenge is so great that there is a need for all of those things, he said. ‘You have my absolute commitment that will be looked at in detail,’ he added.
His comments come after shadow local government secretary Hilary Benn said the next Labour government would look to reform the Housing Revenue Account system. Currently, councils have limits on the amount they can borrow for housing under HRA reforms, which abolished the national redistribution system and made authorities self-financing for council homes.
