Bradford Council's exceptional financial support one of the biggest in England

The council is set to get £127.1 million for 2025/26

Of the 30 councils in England confirmed to be receiving exceptional financial support to help them balance their books in the upcoming financial year, Bradford Council is getting the third biggest sum.

It will get £127.1 million to enable it to “ensure delivery of vital public services, protecting vital community assets and promoting economic stability”, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said.

The two councils receiving more by way of exceptional financial support are Birmingham, which is set to get £180 million and Croydon, for which £136 million has been agreed in-principle.

“We are under no illusion of the state of council finances and have been clear from the outset on our commitment to get councils back on their feet and rebuild the foundation of local government,” Jim McMahon, minister of state for local government and English devolution said.

“We are working with local leaders, encouraging councils to come in confidence where needed to seek help and be assured we will offer a relationship of partnership - not punishment - in our joint mission to improve public services for communities and create economic stability as set out in our plan for change.”

Beyond this, the Labour government says it is working on reforming the approach to local government funding, with a view to moving to multi-year settlements from 2026-27 in order to “help local authorities with planning and long-term sustainability”.

News of the amount of exceptional financial support being provided comes weeks after the government gave Bradford Council the green light to put council tax up by 9.99%, which Rebecca Poulsen, leader of the Conservative Group on Bradford Council lambasted in The Ilkley Journal.

“Everyone I speak to is furious about the incompetence of Bradford Council and that residents now face a huge council tax increase to pay for increasingly poor services and a litany of financial disasters,” she said.

“There is to be no referendum or consultation with residents over the huge council tax rise and it will now be up to the 90 Bradford District councillors to vote in March on whether to accept this increase or reject it.”

In response to criticism of the proposal, from politicians and locals alike – with one individual recently telling the BBC that it always seems to be the case that the public "continually pays for the mistakes of those higher up" – Susan Hinchcliffe, the Labour leader of Bradford Council, said that the blame for the poor financial state of the council lay with the former Conservative government.

“Government austerity over the last 14 years has left places like Bradford in a really challenging situation, with £350 million taken off Bradford over that time,” she said. “And that has really meant that we’ve had to cut our services back much more than we’d like.”