Local govts in England face 'bankruptcy'

英格兰政府面临“破产”危机

In April, the new financial year starts in England, and, for millions of households, that means the arrival of the council tax bill — money to be paid to local authorities to fund certain services.
在英格兰，四月标志着新一轮财政年的开始，对于数百万户家庭而言，则意味着市政税账单的到来，即将个税交付给当地机构以资助特定服务。

And bills are set to rocket because a full-on local government funding emergency has erupted, with inescapable consequences for everyone across the country.
由于当地政府资金全面告急，所要缴纳的个税也在激增，每一位公民都无法逃避。

Health and defense are dealt with at a national level, but services such as street cleaning and maintaining parks are collected locally.
公共医疗卫生和国防预算属于国家层面的问题，但诸如道路清洁以及公共设施的维护则由当地政府负责。

According to the Institute for Local Government, in 2014, 7 percent of tax collection in England was done at a local level, compared with 12 percent in Italy, 32 percent in Germany, and almost 50 percent in Canada, meaning local authorities are heavily reliant on central government funding. But between 2009 and 2019, those government contributions fell by 40 percent.
根据英国地方政府研究所的数据，在2014年，英格兰将7%的税收拨款给地方政府，而相比之下，意大利、德国和加拿大下放到地方的税收比例分别为12%，32%和50%，这意味着地方政府在很大程度上依赖中央政府的财政支持。但在2009-2019年间，这些政府的拨款资金下降了40%。

In 2009, in the aftermath of the global financial crisis, prime minister David Cameron, who left office in 2016 following Brexit, announced in a speech that "the age of irresponsibility is giving way to the age of austerity… a new culture of thrift".
2009年，受全球经济危机的影响，时任首相戴维·卡梅伦（David Cameron）在一次演讲中宣布：“不负责任的时代已经过去，紧衣缩食的时代已经来临...勤俭节约正成为一种新的文化”。英国脱欧事件后，卡梅伦于2016年离职。

The issue was largely ignored until the recent dam-burst, which has seen councils declaring bankruptcy and services facing bigger cuts than ever before.
直到最近大坝决堤、市政当局宣告破产、服务预算面临前所未有削减的时候，这个问题才开始受到重视。

Kevin Muldoon-Smith, an associate professor in strategic public-sector finance at Northumbria University, told China Daily that various factors had contributed to the crisis, the main one being central government funding cuts, resulting in "a whole system that exists on the margins of financial viability".
诺桑比亚大学战略性公共部门财政领域的副教授凯文·穆尔顿-史密斯（Kevin Muldoon-Smith）向《每日中国》透露，导致这场危机的因素是多方面的，主要原因还是中央政府削减了资金，最终导致财政系统面临崩溃。

"The problem now is that trying to get hold of and fix local government finance is politically very painful. It's become less about consciously trying to reduce the state, more of a fear of the complexity of having to fix the problem," he said.
“当前的问题在于，从政治上角度而言，地方政府财政问题解决起来非常棘手。面对难以回避且错综复杂的财政赤字，人们的第一感觉是恐惧而不是迎难而上。”

According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies' Green Budget, published in 2021, "driven by cuts in central government funding, English councils' noneducation spending per resident fell by almost a quarter in real terms between 2009-10 and 2019-20".
英国财政研究所2021年发布的《绿色预算》表示：“由于中央政府财政拨款削减，在2009-10年到2019-20年间，英国各地方政府人均非教育支出实际下降了近四分之一。”

Clive Betts, chairman of the all-parties parliamentary Levelling up, Housing, and Communities Committee, told The Guardian that there was an "out-of-control" financial crisis in local councils across England.
多党派议会升级、住房以及社团委员会（all-parties parliamentary Levelling up, Housing, and Communities Committee）主席克莱武·贝兹（Clive Betts）在接受《卫报》（The Guardian）采访时表示，英格兰当地委员会的财政危机已经失控。

"Councils are hit by a double harm of increased demands for services while experiencing a significant hit to their real-terms spending power in recent years," he said. "The government must use the local government financial settlement to help bridge the 4-billion-pound ($5 billion) funding gap for 2024-25 or risk already strained council services becoming stretched to breaking point."
“近年来，地方政府面临着服务业支出费用增加以及消费能力下滑的双重打击。当地政府必须出台相应的方案来偿还2024-2025年40亿英镑（合50亿美元）的财政缺口，否则本来严峻的资助型服务业会更加举步维艰。”

In 2018, Northamptonshire County Council became the first local authority in 20 years to issue a section 114 notice — this quasi-bankruptcy step prevents any new council expenditure, other than on maintaining support services for the most vulnerable.
2018年，北安普敦郡议会成为了20年来首次发布第114条通知的地方政府——这一准破产举措规定除了对最贫困的人群依旧提供支持性资助外，其他新产生的支出费用一律不予批准。

Since then, Slough, Croydon, Thurrock and Woking, all in the southeast of England, and two major Midlands metropolitan councils, Birmingham City and Nottingham City, have followed suit, while the Daily Mirror newspaper reported 40 more councils are at risk.
之后，英格兰东南部的所有市政局（斯劳、克罗伊登、瑟罗克和沃金在内的），以及两个主要的中部城市议会（伯明翰市和诺丁汉市）也纷纷效仿，而据《每日镜报》报道，还有40多个委员会仍处于危机中。

The most high-profile problem is in Europe's largest local authority, Birmingham, which provides services for more than 1 million people, and that has the second-largest Chinese population of any British city, after Manchester.
伯明翰作为欧洲最大的地方性机构，面临的财政问题最为严峻。其市政局为超过数百万居民提供公共服务，而且拥有的中国人口数目仅次于曼彻斯特，居第二位。

'Going bust'
“正在面临破产的境地”

In September, years of difficulties saw the council effectively go bust, with a deficit for the year of $110 million following a lost court case about unequal pay to council workers that cost it hundreds of millions of pounds.
9月，经年累月的困境致使伯明翰市政局实质性破产了，在一场关于委员会职工不公平待遇的官司败诉后，伯明翰市政府支付了上亿英镑的赔偿金，导致今年的财政赤字高达1.1亿英镑。

Birmingham has been given special dispensation to raise council tax by up to 10 percent for each of the next two years, a move so drastic that it would usually require a local referendum.
之后该市政府得到了特殊豁免权，可在接下来的两年内美年提高10%的市政税。这种特例行为通常需要当地公民进行投票才能决定。

On top of redundancies and cuts across council services, Birmingham council leader John Cotton apologized "unreservedly" to local residents during the meeting where the "devastating" budget was passed.
除了裁员和削减市政服务之外，伯明翰委员会领导人约翰·科顿在会议期间坦诚得向当地居民进行致歉，表示市政府已经投票通过了这项差强人意的预算。

Following the passing of the budget, the council's Chief Executive Deborah Cadman announced she would step down after three years in the role, saying it had "always" been her "intention to leave the council once the budget was agreed, and we had a clear route to recovery and improvement… having led on the development of the council's new improvement and recovery plan, I feel that now is the right time to hand over the baton".
预算案通过后，委员会首席执行官黛博拉·卡德曼宣布三年后她将卸任该职务，她表示在委员会的职责就是帮助委员会制定好预算案，“对于如何恢复和发展经济，我们已经有了一条明确的道路...目前委员会内已经有了经济恢复和提升的计划，我认为当前是岗位交接最好的时候。”

Nottingham City Council lost millions of pounds in a failed energy company venture and in February, the government appointed external commissioners to help run the council's finances at its own expense.
诺丁汉市政局对一家能源公司投资失败，损失了上百万英镑。2月份，政府委托外部委员帮助委员会管理财政开支。

Early last month, council leader David Mellen told the BBC that councilors had voted to approve a harsh budget "with great reluctance", including a 5 percent council tax rise, cuts to services and redundancies to plug a deficit of $67 million.
早在上个月，委员会领导人大卫·梅伦向BBC透漏，议员勉强通过了一项预算方案，该方案包括5%的议会增税，削减服务费用，并且进行裁员以填补6700万美元的财政亏损。

"To have community protection officers in their streets, to have a voluntary sector that offers cheap play schemes to children and their families, all those things are a basic requirement of councils and those are the areas that we're having to cut today because of a broken care system that a number of prime ministers have said that they will fix but they haven't done it," he said.
街道上有社区保护官员，居民可以享受到性价比高的娱乐设施，这些都是委员会最基本的工作，但当前由于保障系统崩溃，有些地区不得不砍掉相关预算。尽管时任首相曾经承诺要完善系统但至今仍没有答复。

Mellen also quit following the passing of the budget, telling the BBC "some people will say (the financial problem is) my fault — and they do — and others will see a bigger picture of the context in which I've been the political leader of the city council".
梅伦也在预算案通过后辞职，并且对BBC表示“在我担任委员会领导人期间，有些人未来可能将财政问题推到我的头上，有些人现在已经这样认为了；而也有些人也将会见证到更宏伟的蓝图。”

"Whether I've got everything right or wrong, others will judge, but I've been committed to the city that I've lived in for 40 years."
后人自会对我的对与错进行评价，但我已经为我生活了40年的城市贡献了所有热血。

Muldoon-Smith of Northumbria University said the system is flawed.
诺桑比亚大学副教授凯文·穆尔顿-史密斯认为这个系统存在漏洞。

"Central government tries to say it's down to local government mismanagement but this process has shown local government is not an independent being, it's inextricably part of an integrated system in terms of finance and management," he said.
中央政府想要表示系统漏洞应该归因于当地政府管理不当，但这个过程也显示出地方政府并不是一个独立的个体，无论财政还是管理，地方政府都是整体系统不可分割的一部分。

"All international studies show countries where it works best have systems where different tiers of government know what they need to do.
所有的国际研究表明运作良好的国家都会有一套各司其职的系统。

"Overseas, local governments have much more access to other sources of income, like value added tax, income tax. In England it's reliant on council tax, property tax and central government transfers.
地方政府在海外有更多的收入来源，比如增值税和所得税等，而在内陆地区则主要依赖于地方政府税、财产税和中央政府拨款。

"This is a problem that can't be ignored, so we've moved from the stage of not thinking about it to the stage where people are starting to listen, but we're not quite at the solution stage yet," Muldoon-Smith said.
这是一个无法忽视的问题，所以我们不能像过去一样不进行思考，而是要开始学会倾听反思，但是目前我们还无法做到。