Fresh hope for fairer funding for capital’s cash-strapped boroughs 

London boroughs have been given fresh hope that they may eventually receive the funding they need due to a series of proposals to improve the capital's currently inaccurate population data.

Many of these proposals appear to take on board London Councils' requests for improved data collection, use of other administrative data sources, and closer working with local authorities. These recommendations were put to ministers by London Councils last year following changes to way the Office for National Statistics (ONS) estimate international migration within population statistics.  These changes resulted in significantly lower estimates and projections of the capital's population which are used by Government to allocate resources to local authorities for essential frontline services including social care and community safety for the next three years.

London Councils welcomes the ONS' announcement that they are considering a range of changes including improving port surveys; publishing estimates of short-term migration at local authority level; and working with other government departments to collect supplementary data, including information on children in schools.