Public health allocations are due to be held flat in real terms for three years, despite the government’s intended “shift from treatment to prevention”.

Figures published by the local government department have revealed how much ministers plan to spend on the public health grant to local councils over the period.

The sum, £12.1bn, cannot amount to more than simply matching forecast inflation in each of the three years, analysts confirmed to HSJ.

The allocation – which pays for health services including health visiting, sexual health, school nursing, and weight management, as well as other public health activities – was repeatedly cut in real terms under the last government.

The Labour government increased it by 3 per cent on top of inflation in 2025/26, raising hopes – alongside health and social care secretary Wes Streeting’s promise of a “shift from treatment to prevention” – that it may gradually be restored.

But Health Foundation assistant director for prevention Jason Strelitz told HSJ   that only keeping pace with inflation for the next three years – as the new figures suggest – “will leave the grant cut by a quarter on a real-term per capita basis since 2015/16”.

He welcomed the government’s move to longer-term three-year allocations, but said: “The NHS budget is set to grow in real terms over the parliament. Yet, the public health grant and the government’s proposed radical shift towards prevention are being left behind.

“With working-age health deteriorating, a multi-year plan to restore the grant to 2015/16 levels is needed.”

Government is also expected to order local authorities to review each others’ public health departments and spend to try to drive more benefit from the grant. Mr Strelitz, a former public health director, said this could “help optimise plans”.

Another senior figure in the sector said that, while they would like the grant to grow in real terms, many public health directors were now more concerned about continuing spending cuts hitting other parts of local government and the voluntary sector, which would do more damage to health outcomes.

The Department of Health and Social Care, which awards the public health grant, was asked if it wanted to comment.

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