What the Budget means for Oxfordshire

Rachel Reeves with the traditional red box. Picture by Simon Dawson / No 10 Downing Street.

Rachel Reeves (PPE, New College) has delivered a budget which, at first sight, has much more for Cambridge than Oxford.

The Other Place™ gets new housing, support for the “wider Cambridge life sciences cluster”, £10m for the Cambridge Growth Company, a consultation on a new railway, and a shout-out as a “generally renowned centre of excellence”. Oxford is relegated to a supporting role, equal with Milton Keynes. That stings.

Even the Cambridge graduates on Team Clarion are offended by this.

The press is awash with general Budget commentary. You don’t need us to add more on the big picture for the NHS, social care and the economy: we can do no better than to point you to the analysis by Michael McMahon, Professor of Economics at the University of Oxford. Here, instead, are a few highlights that will affect Oxfordshire specifically.

Transport

East West Rail: The Budget nods towards Oxford–Milton Keynes services from next year and to Bedford from 2030 (both announced under the Conservative government), and then says: “To deliver the next stages of East West Rail the government is launching a consultation.” This refers to the new-build railway from Bedford to Cambridge which would complete the project. Consultations are ten a penny and this isn’t exactly spades in the ground. Still, those with hopes of travelling to Cambridge by train will be reassured that the project remains live, albeit unfunded. The ticking timebomb is how this affects Bicester: new services to Bedford and beyond will mean the town’s level crossing spends more time closed. New Bicester & Woodstock MP Calum Miller has followed previous incumbent Victoria Prentis in lobbying for a solution.
Bus fares and fuel duty: Fuel duty was frozen in the Budget, while the most common bus fare was raised by 50% from £2 to £3. You can readily re-enact how this will have gone down with Oxfordshire County Council, which has been spending much of its literal and political capital on encouraging Oxford commuters to switch from car to bus. Does this mean it will need to bring in further car restrictions to meet its traffic reduction targets?

Housing

Short lets: Oxford City Council’s long-standing plea for taxation and regulation on ‘short lets’ (Airbnbs) has been ignored. There were several policy announcements on housing and planning – reducing Right-to-Buy discounts, social housing rent, new recruits for planning authorities – but nothing on short lets. This would perhaps have been the “quickest win” in Oxford’s housing crisis and there will be understandable frustration at the missed opportunity.
Council housing: On the other hand, changes to the Right-to-Buy scheme – reducing discounts and earmarking all receipts for the selling council – should be good news for the City Council. The Budget documents say this will “ensure that vital social housing is available to those who need it most”.
Planning: The promise of £46m to recruit 300 new planning officers is pretty small beer spread across Britain’s 392 planning authorities, but especially in high-value areas like Oxfordshire, where district councils are already suffering a “brain drain” as experienced officers are lured into private sector consultancy by the higher salaries on offer.

Oxfordshire’s councils

Core funding: Central government funding to local councils is increasing by 3.2% next year – much earmarked for social care, which currently eats up 66% of council budgets. Though less than councils have asked for, Oxfordshire’s council leaders will find this settlement a little less gruelling than recent years.
Funding pots: The £1bn pledged for special educational needs will be particularly welcome for Oxfordshire’s troubled SEN provision, while £233m to tackle homelessness will make a difference in Oxford city.
How councils work: But the Budget also pledges to “work with councils to move to simpler structures that make sense for their local areas, with efficiency savings from council reorganisation helping to meet the needs of local people”. This is widely understood to be a move towards unitary councils – which could mean city and districts being subsumed into Oxfordshire County Council, or (less likely) the historic county being parcelled up into two or three single-tier councils.

County and economy

Flooding and sewage: There are ominous words for flooding investment in future years – a particular concern in Oxford and other low-lying parts of Oxfordshire. The Budget document warns that “While the government is meeting commitments this year, it is necessary to review these plans from 2025-26 to ensure they are affordable.”
Solar farms: The Budget is bullish about “acting to progress infrastructure projects through the planning system”, boasting of four large solar farms approved since the General Election. Botley West Solar Farm’s promoters and supporters will feel emboldened.
Independent schools: Oxford’s private school market is fierce, and none of them will have welcomed the confirmation of VAT on school fees. That said, sought-after schools like St Edward’s and Magdalen College School will continue to fill up regardless, while the smaller specialists like progressive D’Overbroecks and the choir schools will retain their USPs. The greatest impact is likely to be felt in the smallest schools: some outside the city could close, while others may change shape to survive, going co-educational or closing infant departments.
Farming: Oxfordshire is the south-east’s most rural county and although we don’t take farming dilettante Jeremy Clarkson’s view as representative, the NFU is no more impressed. The Nature Friendly Farming Network, however, gave the Budget a thumbs-up, praising “vital and timely support for a sector facing the urgent challenges of climate change”.

Reaction

Oxfordshire’s five LibDem MPs highlighted the lack of spending on social care, and positioned themselves to the left of Labour with a call for banks and tech giants to pay more. In a joint statement, they said: “We’re pleased the government has listened to the LibDems’ calls for more investment in the NHS, but we remain deeply concerned they are still ignoring the elephant in the waiting room: the crisis in social care. Instead of raising the money we need by reversing Conservative tax cuts for the big banks, or asking the social media and tech giants to pay a bit more, the Chancellor has chosen unfair tax hikes that will hurt the hard-working families, small businesses and family farms that are the engines of our economy.”
Labour’s local MPs Anneliese Dodds and Sean Woodcock echoed national messaging, talking about “taking the tough decisions now” and “a pay rise worth £1,400 a year for a full time employee”; as Minister of State for Development, Dodds highlighted “more lifesaving humanitarian aid”. Oxfordshire’s Labour councillors called it “a foundation for a growing economy” (Duncan Enright) and praised “Labour In Power ✊” (Anna Railton), though Ruth Smith from the train desert of Witney conceded “The bus fares at £2 really were something”.
Oxfordshire Conservative leader Eddie Reeves also highlighted the bus fare rise, calling it a “covert #CostOfLiving hike” and part of “an historic, tax-raising #Budget filled with broken promises”. Oxford West & Abingdon election candidate Vinay Raniga shared a graph calling out “the highest tax burden in history, paid nearly in its entirety by working people”.
For the Green Party, Oxford councillor Emily Kerr called out the disparity between motoring and active travel spending. “The government claimed it would be investing ‘unprecedented’ amounts in active travel. The Black Cat roundabout in Bedford cost £1.4bn for motor improvements. £100m active travel funding for the entire UK is woefully inadequate.”

What next?

Oxfordshire politicians will have been watching today’s coverage with an eye to their chances of (re-)election at the County Council elections in May.

It’s a truism that people often vote locally on their perception of the national party. Labour’s honeymoon under Keir Starmer has been shorter than most new governments’. The Conservatives will be hoping that discontent with Labour nationally will mean good news for them on Oxfordshire’s councils, and particularly in the Con/Lab battleground of Banbury. They’re no threat to Labour in Oxford city, but any national swing away from Labour could open up a chance for the Independent Oxford Alliance.

Much of the detail of this Budget remains incompletely sketched. Local council funding won’t be settled until the forthcoming Local Government Finance Settlement. Housing remains dependent on planning reforms, still out to consultation, and whatever decisions Homes England might make. By May, we will have a clearer picture of the dividing lines.