Question
In rural Cumbria, those without a car struggle to access education and jobs, which is why families on the lowest incomes prioritise car ownership. However, our councils lost out on significant financial support because funding formulas used car ownership as a determinant of income. Will the Secretary of State carry out a review of this approach, and perhaps ask whether civil servants who are privileged enough to travel to work on one of the world’s finest public transport systems are giving us duff advice?50% point-scoring
Answer
The fair funding review deliberately took into account the different types of local authorities that were funded through the settlement, from London authorities and urban authorities to authorities for coastal or rural communities. For the first time we made sure that deprivation was picked up in the funding formula, and the level at which we did that was in the hundreds of households, not the thousands or tens of thousands of households. The idea behind that is to enable us to really home in on where deprivation exists across the country.
Verdict: RED (5/100)
The reply does not answer either part of the question. On the first point, it says the fair funding review considered rural and coastal authorities, but it never mentions car ownership as a factor in the funding formula and gives no commitment to review it. On the second point, the reply says nothing about the adequacy of civil servants' advice or their commuting habits. A member of the public reading this would have no answer to either point and would likely need to ask again.
How we got there
| Question item | Coverage | Specificity | Rationale |
|---|---|---|---|
| Will the Secretary of State carry out a review of the funding formulas' use of car ownership as a determinant of income, which the member says has cost rural Cumbrian councils significant funding? | Not Addressed | Generic | The reply says the fair funding review considered rural and coastal authorities, but it never mentions car ownership as a formula determinant or commits to reviewing it, so the specific request is unanswered. |
| Whether the civil servants advising on the use of car ownership in funding formulas are giving poor advice, given that they are said to travel to work on public transport. | Not Addressed | Generic | Nothing in the reply addresses the adequacy of civil servants' advice or their commuting habits; the rhetorical point is ignored entirely. |