Councils draft plans to keep services running

COUNCILS across the UK are drafting plans for delivering public services after Brexit against a backdrop of uncertainty as fraught negotiations continue.

A Sky News report revealed on Tuesday that Dover District Council and Kent County Council are preparing for a 13-mile Brexit lorry park on the M20 southbound to be in place for at least four years.

Anglesey, home to Holyhead port, is one of several port authorities also concerned about a need for lorry parking after Brexit, Sky News found.

Pembrokeshire County Council’s risk register details how new border controls “may affect the ready availability of vital supplies”, including food and medicine.

The risk register also warns of “increased bad debt” due to a “widely predicted economic downturn” and “continued austerity”, as well as a threat to existing and future EU-funded regeneration programmes.

Similar concerns from councils the length and breadth of the UK have now emerged over how to provide food, social care, medicines and border controls, and about potential “social unrest”.

A Shetland Islands Council document focuses on farming, with a dramatic rise forecast in loss-making sheep farms – from 50% now to 86% in a no-deal Brexit – due to tariffs on lamb.

Bristol City Council warns of a “top-line threat” of “social unrest or disillusionment during/after negotiations as neither Leave nor Remain voters feel their concerns are being met”.

East Sussex County Council was among several authorities expressing concern about the impact on the provision of social care after Brexit.

Sky News also found almost all councils expressed significant concern about how the Treasury will replace crucial EU structural and regional funds – particularly now the PM has promised any money that might materialise after Brexit to the NHS.

Another common feature is exasperation that councils do not know what to plan for.

Local Government Association Brexit Taskforce chairman Kevin Bentley said exiting the EU will have a “significant impact” on councils, creating challenges but also opportunities to do things differently.

He said: “Brexit will ultimately be judged as a success or failure by localities – real people in real communities.”