The Treasury will look closely at the economics of each of the unitary status bids, chief secretary to the Treasury, Stephen Timms, has vowed.
Speaking at the NLGN's finance conference in London, Mr Timms said: ‘I can give my assurance that the Treasury will want to look closely at the financial aspects of the bids.'
He told delegates the Treasury would respond fully to the Lyons inquiry.
He also called for ‘radical thinking in shared services and procurement, and said local government would have a key role to play on the themes of the
Comprehensive Spending Review 07, due out in the autumn.
The themes are:

Junior local government minister, Angela Smith, told delegates that local government financing must be changed to ‘truly local financing' through LAAs.
‘Let me make it absolutely clear that LAAs are not just desirable, they are also the only option out there.'
She said that in 12 month's time, LAAs would be able to ‘fully share expenditure so they can work towards the same goals'.
‘These are goals about local people and their quality of life, not organisational goals of the separate partners'.