‘We need our money back’
LOCAL authorities in Lancashire have called on the Government to properly reimburse them for the cost of dealing with the Covid-19 outbreak after funding fell by £6m.
The call comes after the Government announced a second allocation of money for Lancashire to support the efforts being made to keep residents, especially the most vulnerable, protected.
However the amount that has been given to the county has left the councils “deeply disappointed” as their share of the funding has reduced by £6m compared to the first tranche of funding paid at the end of March.
Lancashire is one of the worst hit areas in the country in respect of the cut in its allocation.
Leaders from all of Lancashire’s local authorities, including West Lancashire Borough Council, have now written to the Government to explain how “the county has risen to the challenge of maintaining essential services while also taking action to deal with the significant impact the virus has had on residents and businesses”.
Those actions include establishing Community Support Hubs in each of the county’s 14 district and boroughs, contacting almost 30,000 of the most socially or clinically vulnerable residents to determine what support they need, sourcing millions of items of Personal Protective Equipment to keep key workers safe, and supporting the county’s social care sector.
Cllr Geoff Driver CBE, leader of Lancashire
County Council and chairman of the Lancashire Leaders group, said: “At the beginning of this crisis, the Government called upon all local authorities to play their part in responding to the impact of the pandemic.
“Collectively, we have done magnificently in extremely difficult circumstances, and are continuing to do so. In fact the Lancashire Resilience Forum, which all the county’s local authorities support, is considered nationally as one of the most effective.
“We are calling upon the Government to deliver on the promises which have been made and ensure a full reimbursement of all costs, whether additional expenditure or loss of income, arising from the impact of Covid-19, and also acknowledgement that these costs will be incurred over a lengthy period of time.
“The inescapable fact is that local government as a whole needs a much bigger injection of funds from government to cover the financial burden caused by Covid-19 which includes lost income and planned savings not being achieved as well as the huge increases in expenditure.”