Council Tax support mess shows perils of hiding spending cuts under cover of localisation 20 November 2025 Devolving Council Tax support in 2013-14 has massively increased the amount of social security now being administered locally in England. But this change has caused acute and often arbitrary hardship for vulnerable families – illustrating the perils of passing responsibility for deep spending cuts onto local authorities – according to new research published today (Thursday). The localisation era – part of the Nuffield Foundation-funded Safety Nets project – analyses trends in localised social security over time and assesses whether the rise of localised social security support has helped or hindered families’ living standards. By far the biggest area of localised social security has been the replacement of the nationally administered Council Tax Benefit (CTB) with the locally administered Council Tax Reduction (CTR) for working-age families in England from 2013-14. CTR now accounts for two-thirds of all localised welfare support and will cost £4.1 billion in 2025-26. However, this has not been a simple devolution exercise as it has been accompanied by significant funding cuts. Overall spending on support for Council Tax in England has fallen by 31 per cent – £1.9 billion in real-terms – since CTR was introduced. The number of families receiving support fell from 5.9 million in 2012-13 to 3.7 million in 2024-25. Seven-in-ten local authorities across England offer less support compared to the old CTB, and in some areas support has been cut by half. Less-generous schemes correlate with higher levels of deprivation and lower financial resilience – suggesting localisation has weakened support for those most likely to struggle paying Council Tax. Less generous schemes are also more likely to be found in local authorities under Conservative control than those controlled by other parties. This has led to large variation in the generosity of support across local authorities in England. A family living in a Band D property and receiving the maximum level of CTR in Doncaster would pay no Council Tax this year. If, however, they moved a few miles across the border to North Lincolnshire, they would have to pay nearly £1,400. The report says that the mess of Council Tax Reduction highlights the perils of doing spending cuts alongside localisation. CTR should be re-centralised to level out support across England (and equalise support between England, Scotland and Wales) and reduce the administrative burden on local authorities. The localisation era finds that there may be more logic for localisation of other forms of social security support, such as crisis support which has been delivered by successive rounds of the Household Support Fund, first introduced in 2021. In the case of the multi-year Crisis and Resilience Fund, which replaces the Household Support Fund next year, the efficacy of support is based on its funding being ring-fenced by central government (and throughout the Spending Review period), while local authorities have genuine discretion about how to deliver it. Alex Clegg, Economist at the Resolution Foundation, said: “Britain’s social security system is highly centralised, but in England locally delivered support has been massively increased by the devolution of Council Tax support. “However, local authorities were given responsibilities for providing Council Tax Reduction at the same time as their overall budgets were slashed. This created huge pressure to cut support and has caused acute, and often arbitrary, hardship for vulnerable families, who now face stark variation in their Council Tax bills depending on where they live. It is time to abandon this reform and re-centralise support. Ruth Patrick, Professor in Social and Public Policy at the University of Glasgow, who leads the Safety Nets project, said: “Localised support is often used as a panacea for shortcomings in our national social security system, but the overall spend is just a tiny fraction of the working-age welfare budget. This often leaves councils avoiding advertising the schemes they do run, for fear that the demand and level of unmet need will quickly overwhelm what is only a very modest amount of help available. “As the Government prepares to roll-out the Crisis and Resilience Fund next year we need to consider how and why social security is devolved within the UK, and recognise both the possibilities and risks that come with the localisation of essential forms of support.” Notes to Editors Safety Nets: social security for families in a devolved UK is a major Nuffield Foundation-funded project featuring researchers from seven UK universities, the Resolution Foundation and Child Poverty Action Group, exploring the devolution and localisation of social security within the UK, and the realities, risks, and opportunities this poses for families with dependent children. See https://safetynets.study/ for more information.
