Councils are planning to invest an extra £308m this year on adult social care services, according to official figures.

The statistics showed councils also planned to up their spending on children's and families social care services by £136m, with an extra £175m being spent on public health services.

Communities secretary Greg Clark said: ‘At a time when local authorities are playing their part in paying down the deficit, more than £300m extra will be invested this year to deliver high-quality adult social care services.

‘Councils will have almost £200bn to spend on services over the lifetime of this Parliament and I'm pleased the vast majority are also making use of new flexibilities to prioritise the services people really care about.'

The Government claimed councils will have an extra £3bn to spend on care for the elderly and vulnerable over the lifetime of this Parliament, including £2bn raised through the new social care precept and a further £1.5bn through the Better Care Fund.

Its statistics showed that local authorities were planning on raising £80m by selling surplus assets to help transform services.