Shrewsbury MP Daniel Kawczynski in plea to minister over Shropshire Council funding

The MP has written to Greg Clarke, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, to highlight the extra costs of providing services in a rural area.

He has called for intervention to ensure that rural councils do not lose out when compared to their urban counterparts.

It comes after Shropshire Council leader Malcolm Pate said he had written to David Cameron asking for a greater portion of council funding to be given to rural authorities.

A number of councillors at the authority have also pledged to take part in a cross-party delegation to Westminster to raise their concerns over the issue.

Mr Kawczynski has also warned that he is prepared to go against his party unless it reconsiders the balance of funding between rural and urban areas.

Daniel Kawczynski's open letter to local government minister Greg Clarke:

"Shropshire is a sparsely populated county with an ageing population. I am writing to highlight the need for our Government to ensure reasonable funding for our rural councils.

Shropshire Council has informed me it has already implemented almost £150 million of cuts over the last six years and will need to make a further £36m in savings in 2016/17 to balance the budget. The outlook for 2017/18 and 2018/19 is that further cuts of around £20m will be required.

As pressures in adult services continue to escalate, the council is concerned that these pressures have not been recognised in their provisional settlement. It understands the need to contribute to the Government's austerity measures and will continue to drive down costs where possible; however, it believes that some cost pressures are outside service control and are driven by much wider economic factors.

The council believes the following points need addressing in any fair settlement for Shropshire.

• Shropshire’s over 65 year old population is growing at a faster rate than the national average:

Shropshire can expect to see its population of over 65 year olds grow 14 per cent by 2020, this compares to 12 per cent nationally. Shropshire is also seeing continued and significant cost pressures arising in a number of other areas. For example 'capital reduction'. On average 10 people per month are requiring support because they have depleted their assets to a level which means they are eligible for funded support from adult social care.

Each person costs on average £23,000 per year. This has the potential to add as much as £2.8m per year to adult social care costs.

Other areas of cost pressure arise as a result of hospital discharge behaviour, health funding reductions, lack of supply and fair cost of care responsibilities, transition, people generally living longer, breakdown in family structures and economic climate where it is causing reductions in personal wealth.

• Historic Underfunding of rural sparsely populated authorities:

The current funding formula is locked in the previous assessments of spending need. The Government now recognises the costs of providing services in rural areas is more, however, their method of addressing this has been too little too late. The Rural Delivery Grant of £65m nationally by 2019/20 should be brought forward to 2016/17.

• Changes in funding distribution methodology:

The funding allocation methodology used for the provisional settlement disadvantages high tax base authorities like Shropshire.

Shropshire disagrees with the proposed approach to allocate central funding in 2016/17.

The methodology results in Shropshire losing an additional £1.5m in funding in 2016/17 compared to the approach used in previous years where all authorities' allocations have been scaled back by the same percentage (ie applying the overall -26.7 per cent reduction).

Shropshire's reduction in Settlement Funding is 31 per cent compared to the average of 26.7 per cent for all authorities.

By contrast, the effect of the proposed approach essentially increases funding for metropolitan districts and Inner London by an additional £93m and £53m respectively.

Shropshire is seriously concerned about the level of reductions in services. I share the concerns of this rural council and fear that the people of Shropshire will see the loss of many well used community services which have been part of the services Shropshire has provided for many years."