Manchester authority is set to take control of £6bn worth of health and social care spending

Greater Manchester local authority is set to become the first in England to take control of the area’s entire £6bn (€8.2bn; $9.3bn) budget for health and social care, under a radical new plan backed by the chancellor of the exchequer, George Osborne.

The plan, expected to be confirmed by Osborne on Friday 27 February, will hand NHS spending powers to a larger region-wide health and wellbeing board from April 2016. The move follows the government’s devolution deal in 2014, which pledged to hand greater power to cities in the north of England.

It will mark the first time a local council in England has been handed direct control of health budgets in addition to the social care budgets they already hold.

The plan was developed after discussions involving 10 …