Thank you, Minister. I appreciate the response. I raise this with you as I have some grave concerns that the current funding formula is no longer fit for purpose. It was put in place many years ago—we know the history of that—and it may have been right for that time, but I don't believe that it's right for the situation that we're in now. 

As a past long-standing council leader, I have seen the growing disparity between funding and reserves of various councils and have argued that the system is out of date and requires review. We currently see variations in funding per capita from £1,000 to over £1,700 per person, with an expectation for lower funded councils to just keep turning to increases in council tax to block the shortfalls and this isn't sustainable. Minister, do you believe that recognising rurality, sparsity and the increased unit cost of delivering services in large rural authorities will be fundamental in any revised formula or method of funding local authorities?