Published 27th Apr 2023, 11:45 BST

Research published by Barnsley-based SIGOMA (Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities) shows that Bradford has received real term cuts of around 28.5 per cent since 2010, while Hull is at 27.9. This compares to the likes of Surrey, in the south-east, which is down 8.3 per cent.

Government funding represented over 55 per cent of councils’ core spending power in 2013-14 but is at just 37 per cent in 2023-24, the group says, with chairman Sir Stephen Houghton adding the structures that support the fair distribution of funds raised through taxation have been replaced by ones tending to reward high-value housing stock and a thriving business rate base.

You would have to be extremely generous not to think that the disparities described in the report are engineered; many will consider them deliberate, and spitefully so. There are clear echoes of accusations in January this year that the Government used its the levelling up fund to funnel money into Tory constituencies, while rejecting Labour-leaning areas with far higher levels of deprivation. Hull and Bradford constituences had missed out, while Catterick, in Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s constituency of Richmond, received £19 million to regenerate the high street.

Bradford, which has suffered some of the biggest council funding cuts. Picture: Simon Hulme.

Meanwhile, Leeds City Council is now having to increase the price of admission to some of its museums and attractions to keep up with, it says, inflation and rising staff costs.

These disparities are unacceptable and reek of indifference towards regional needs.

Council cuts disparities yet more evidence of regional inequalities - The Yorkshire Post says