Is fair funding possible or pie in the sky?

In recent months, my conversations with colleagues and councils seem to be increasingly focused on one thing: pie. Not any old pie though: the funding pie available to English local government. In the next year or so, big decisions will be taken over both the size of this pie in coming years, and how it is sliced up between different councils. These decisions could have big impacts on the quality and quantity of local public services, and the council tax charged in different parts of the country.

So is a fair slicing of the pie possible?

And what about the overall size of the pie - is there enough to go around?

In this article for Public Sector Executive, IFS Associate Director David Phillips discusses the current health of local government finance, and how a better formula could help manage this situation. Read the article in full here.