Marsham Street has ‘an unacceptable lack of ambition' for local government –  with no aspiration for improving finances beyond merely ‘coping', according to a scathing Public Accounts Committee (PAC) report.

The report on local government spending said It was  ‘not acceptable' that the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) ‘repeatedly states that the sector as a whole is sustainable but refuses to provide evidence about how it has reached these conclusions'.