Following Prime Minister Theresa May’s claims that austerity has reached an end, Seamus McDonnell looks into the impact of funding cuts on Bolton.

AUSTERITY cuts have led to a fall in provision for public services and have been linked to stagnating wages and rising homelessness throughout the past decade.

In Bolton, the effect of cuts to funding can be seen most keenly in the money provided for council services and the police.

Since 2011, Bolton Council has been tasked with saving around £150 million to reflect a reduction in direct funding from the government, while active police force numbers in Greater Manchester have fallen by around 24pc since 2010.

For the council, this drop in funding has been combined with greater responsibility over care for both adults and children, leading to increased costs.

“Councils in England receive 1.8 million new requests for adult social care a year,” explained Cllr Richard Watts, chairman of the Local Government Association’s (LGA) resources board.

“Increased spend on adult social care – which now accounts for nearly 40 percent of total council budgets - is threatening the future of other vital council services, such as parks, leisure centres and libraries, which help to keep people well and from needing care and support and hospital treatment.”

The government attempted to respond to this increase in responsibility by creating the adult social care precept in 2016, meaning councils can raise taxes by 2pc on top of the 3pc they are already allowed each year.

However, in Bolton this increase accounted for an extra £3 million annually in 2017/18, plus a public support grant of £1.3 million. Jointly, this is significantly short of covering the costs that the LGA is suggesting.

The squeeze has hit police too, with GMP last week announcing its Citizens Contract, which asks the public to do more to help officers -protect them.

It cited a significant reduction in officers and increased demand and complexity of crime.

Chief constable Ian Hopkins said: “We’re doing all we can with less resources and increased demand, but we need help.

“We have lost a quarter of our officers over the past few years and this, coupled with the changing nature and seriousness of crime means that we have to work together, now more than ever.”

In comparison to these issue, unemployment in Bolton has dropped, with 97pc of people now in work according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Although these figures have been criticised by those in opposition to the government who say the jobs available are often governed by zero-hour contracts and low pay.

On the other hand, wages have begun to rise again after a period of stagnation between 2008 and mid-2014. The ONS says an average Bolton worker is now likely to get £28,000, roughly in line with the national average.

However, some argue this lack of growth in the mid-2010s has caused a rise in rough sleeping.

Writing in the British Medical Journal earlier this year, Mark Fransham and Danny Dorling at the University of Oxford argued that a lack of services for vulnerable people and low supplies of affordable housing - both tied to austerity - have created an increase in homelessness.