Local Government Finance

My hon. Friend is right. He is a former Barnsley council leader and he knows just how unfair and rigged the funding system was under the previous Government. Achieving more fairness in the formula system was part of the consultation we conducted over the summer. Some of the changes that I have announced this afternoon will help to make the system even fairer. I hope that my hon. Friend and the current council leader, Steve Houghton, will welcome the fact that in Barnsley the increase in formula grant—the core grant from central Government—will be, over the next three years, 6 per cent., 3.7 per cent. and 3.1 per cent.