Plan to switch off street lights as part of £77m cuts
PLANS will be put before Lancashire county council’s cabinet next month designed to save the authority £77m.
The proposed measures include reductions in the number of street lights operating in residential areas, better enforcement of bus lanes which are not currently covered by cameras and the introduction of on-street pay and display spaces in some areas.
But the biggest savings will come from the adult and children’s services budgets.
Here, there are plans to move adults with learning disabilities from residential care into specialist flats, reduce the level of direct payments which individuals are allowed to hold for care contingencies from 10 weeks to four and also to end the short break service for children with special educational needs. The equivalent of 163 full-time jobs will be lost if the proposals are accepted, 30 of which are currently vacant, but just over 100 new permanent roles will be created.
It is understood that there could be some opportunities for redeployment.
Leader Geoff Driver said the proposals were about setting the council’s priorities to make its most important services sustainable.
He said: “If we don’t make the finances viable we won’t be able to provide the services to the really vulnerable people of Lancashire and that’s what we’ve promised to do.
“We’ll be providing better services and we will save in the long run if we don’t have to pay for more expensive care in the future.”
More than £3m is expected to be saved by providing alternatives to residential care.
If the proposals are adopted by cabinet on December 3 they are expected to reduce the county council’s budget deficit to £46m by 2022/23.
That means the authority will then be able to set a balanced budget for the next four years, when it was previously unexpected to be able to do so beyond 2019/20.
The biggest individual saving under the plans would come from a reduction to payments made to independent providers who supply overnight care workers.
Almost £7m is expected to saved by bringing the so-called “sleep-in fee” in line with the level paid to county council staff doing the same job.
Meanwhile, the union UNISON has expressed “concern” about a review of home care packages which currently require two staff to see if new equipment could help them be delivered by one worker instead.
Area organiser Jason Hunter said he would have to look at the entire package before commenting in detail, but added that the union would “support any workers who may be put under pressure as a result of the changes”.