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Local Government Finance

There does seem to be a big difference between how Sheffield and other large authorities are going about this, and how Manchester is going about it. The reduction purely in grant is some 15% over the period, but the council is choosing to cut 25%—above and beyond the reduction in grant. But those figures only really stack up if we completely ignore the level of council tax revenue. That is why we are able to say that no authority is receiving a reduction in their spending power of more than 8.8%. That remains an absolute fact, on a measurement that those on the Labour Front Bench urged us to use. The Local Government Association also suggested that measurement, and it is a very sensible way of doing things.