How does my area compare?

Birmingham has the highest total spending on other benefits in 2024-25.

Bereavement Benefit, Incapacity Benefit and Severe Disablement Allowance. Shown in 2026-27 prices, adjusted for inflation so that years can be compared.

Spending on other benefits, total, 2024-25, by local authority

Total, low to high

  1. Under £0.90m
  2. £0.90m to £1.4m
  3. £1.4m to £2.0m
  4. £2.0m to £2.5m
  5. £2.5m to £3.1m
  6. £3.1m and over
  • Estimated value
Spending on other benefits, total, 2024-25, by local authority. Boundaries are simplified. London is also shown larger, in a separate box. Northern Ireland is not covered. Every value is in the table below.
More ways to look at itHow ranks change, why spending changed, and spending compared with the expected level

Total or per person

Does the order change when you count per person?

Each line is one of the 350 ranked local authorities. It joins the area's rank for each way of counting. The 10 highest total are drawn in dark lines.

TotalPer resident1350County Durham 140Bradford 155Cornwall 157Buckinghamshire 172Somerset 185Birmingham 216North Yorkshire 222Glasgow City 237Sheffield 251Leeds 266

What changed

More people, more claims or bigger payments?

Great Britain, State Pension: yearly spending at the rate in February 2023 and in March 2026. The chart splits the change into three parts: the number of people in the age group, the share of them claiming, and the average payment. 2026-27 prices.

Benefit
£120.7bnFebruary 2023+£2.5bnPopulation+£5.2bnShare claiming+£15.0bnPayment size£143.4bnMarch 2026
What changed: State Pension
February 2023£120.7bn
Population+£2.5bn
Share claiming+£5.2bn
Payment size+£15.0bn
March 2026£143.4bn
The share claiming is the number of people claiming per person aged 66 and over. Yearly spending here is the number claiming, times the average weekly payment, times 52. It is not the amount paid out over the year. Population after mid-2024 stays at the mid-2024 figure, so later growth shows in the share claiming.

Compared with similar areas

Is spending higher or lower than expected?

Benefit spending per resident, 2024-25. We compare it with the level we would expect from each area's share of children and of people aged 66 and over, how deprived it is compared with the rest of its nation, and the typical pay of people who live there. 2026-27 prices.

Chart step
This chart needs JavaScript. Each area's expected level is on its area page.
Expected level = £765 − £935 × share aged 0 to 15 + £9,046 × share aged 66 and over − £177 × deprivation decile + £267 × ln(median pay) + £581 × Wales + £224 × Scotland. Fitted by ordinary least squares across 346 local authorities. R² = 0.87. Gold dots are above the expected level and grey dots are below it.

Every local authority

Spending on other benefits, 2024-25. Rank is for total, and 1 is the highest. Areas with fewer than 1,000 people in the age group have no rank. The first 50 of 350 rows are shown.

Spending on other benefits for every local authority, 2024-25
RankNotes
1Birmingham£6.9m£5.83
2Leeds£4.5m£5.37
3Cornwall£3.8m£6.47
4Glasgow City£3.7m£5.67Estimated
5North Yorkshire£3.7m£5.81
6Bradford£3.6m£6.51
7Buckinghamshire£3.6m£6.30
8Somerset£3.6m£6.18
9County Durham£3.6m£6.65
10Sheffield£3.2m£5.49
11Kirklees£3.1m£6.89
12Wiltshire£2.8m£5.43
13Bristol, City of£2.8m£5.75
14South Lanarkshire£2.8m£8.47Estimated
15Fife£2.8m£7.51Estimated
16Liverpool£2.8m£5.48
17Wirral£2.8m£8.49
18Cheshire East£2.8m£6.61
19City of Edinburgh£2.7m£5.00Estimated
20North Lanarkshire£2.6m£7.54Estimated
21Croydon£2.5m£6.20
22Manchester£2.4m£4.13
23West Northamptonshire£2.4m£5.46
24Cheshire West and Chester£2.4m£6.37
25Rotherham£2.3m£8.48
26Dudley£2.3m£7.06
27Dorset£2.3m£5.93
28Leicester£2.3m£5.82
29Aberdeenshire£2.2m£8.46Estimated
30Wakefield£2.2m£6.02
31Sandwell£2.2m£6.25
32Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole£2.2m£5.36
33Doncaster£2.1m£6.67
34Swansea£2.1m£8.51
35Cumberland£2.1m£7.52
36Bolton£2.1m£6.77
37Hillingdon£2.1m£6.30
38Cardiff£2.0m£5.34
39East Riding of Yorkshire£2.0m£5.70
40North Somerset£2.0m£8.93
41Shropshire£2.0m£6.05
42Northumberland£2.0m£6.05
43Walsall£2.0m£6.66
44Calderdale£2.0m£9.34
45North Northamptonshire£2.0m£5.22
46Stockport£1.9m£6.43
47Ealing£1.9m£5.00
48Sefton£1.9m£6.75
49Barnet£1.9m£4.61
50St. Helens£1.9m£9.83

League table of every local authority for the latest period

Values are total unless a column says otherwise. Sources: Department for Work and Pensions, Office for National Statistics, National Records of Scotland.

Every measureThe full list, as plain links

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