Balancing the books likely to hit those in need hardest
SERVICES which are used by the elderly, disabled and children are likely to be hardest hit as Derbyshire County Council tries to overcome a current overspend of £33 million and a predicted shortfall of £39.5 million for the budget year 2024-25 and present a balanced budget.
The local authority’s overall annual budget is around £700 million.
In November, the authority said it had managed to cut a third of its financial black hole from £46 million down to £33 million in the two months since the shortfall had been announced through strict cost-cutting measures.
But the county council acknowledged it would be an uphill battle to save the remaining overspend.
It has now produced a budget document to show how it intends to save the money and this will be debated at a meeting of the county council’s cabinet on Thursday, January 11 and this will be further examined by the authority’s scrutiny process on January 22 before returning to the cabinet once again.
The proposed budget assumes a total council tax increase of 4.99%, reflecting a 2.99% general increase and 2% adult social care precept and also a growth in the number of properties eligible for council tax of 1.5% based on average base growth in recent years.
The efficiency measures, which include the “redesign” of the services provided by the council’s remaining five short-stay residential homes and four building-based day centres for people with a learning disability and/or who are autistic and also of the 16 council-owned and managed residential care homes and ten building-based day care centres for older people, would affect many services used daily by thousands of Derbyshire residents.
Specific detail of what this means is missing from the budget papers but there is an emphasis on people being encouraged to remain in their own homes or obtain care in the community.
Most of these proposals would be subject to consultation and amount to almost £18 million of savings.
Other budget savings proposals in the care services include:
• Extra care facilities for older people - proposal to redesign the current council-owned care and support delivery arrangements within extra care settings
• Children’s Centres - review the delivery of children’s centres operations.
• Early Help Offer - review of children’s services Early Help service.
• Home To School Transport Policy:
- proposal to change policy for post16 home to school transport to be in keeping with other local authorities
• Disability residential short breaks
- proposal to review short break and support services for disabled children
There are also proposals to restrict or charge people for the disposal of tyres and asbestos at the county’s household waste recycling centres and also to bring in more income by offering small businesses the opportunity to use the centres for a fee.
The county’s library and heritage service is also due to come under the spotlight with plans to achieve modernising, rationalising and transforming the way in which the council delivers the services.
Further proposals include scrapping the production of the Derbyshire Now magazine and a reduction in the grounds maintenance budget, which would not require consultation but are part of efficiencies which would save £42 million over the next four years - £28 million of which would be 2024-25.
These savings also include trying to convert council funding for projects into external grants, axing vacancies and a reduction in County Hall opening hours.
County council leader Councillor Barry Lewis and deputy leader Councillor Simon Spencer said they had been left with no choice but to
The elderly could be some of the hardest hit but Councillor Barry Lewis (below), leader of Derbyshire County Council, says the authority has been left with ‘no choice but to put forward a raft of multi-millionpound savings proposals’
put forward the raft of multi-millionpound savings proposals.
The county council has cited higher than anticipated inflation and higher prices for fuel, energy and materials, meeting the cost of the national pay award set nationally but met locally, and the continued unprecedented increase in demand for vital adults’ and children’s social care services as reasons for the budget deficit.
Mr Lewis said: “We have always prided ourselves on being a prudent, financially stable and well-managed council, balancing our books from year to year, maintaining a strong level of reserves and keeping council tax as low as possible, while providing vital, value-for-money services for our residents.
“However, we have made no secret of the fact that we are facing pressures like never before.
“We have been calling for more Government support and for a drastic change to the way we are funded, especially in children’s and adults’ social care, to ensure we can continue to stay afloat.
“As recently as December, we called for urgent additional funding and a pledge of intervention in the immediate future to fix the deeply broken and uncompetitive market for children’s residential care.
“No council leader ever wants to be
in a position where they are putting forward cost-saving measures of this nature.
“We have to do everything we can to balance our books and ensure we continue to provide the services our residents rely on and deserve, and to do that we have no choice but to put forward these proposals which, if agreed, could help us to achieve that.”
Mr Spencer said that over the past 13 years, the county council had made £300 million of budget savings. He said: “It becomes more and more difficult to find savings from already very lean and efficient services.
“All avenues have been explored and we will continue to do our best for the residents of Derbyshire, but unfortunately we have reached the point where we need to make those tough decisions.
“If these savings and efficiency proposals do not progress, alternative savings will need to be found in order to meet our legal obligations to maintain a balanced budget.
“It is too early to talk about job losses but unfortunately redundancies cannot be ruled out with the scale of the budget savings we have to make.”
After scrutiny, the budget-setting report will be considered by cabinet at its meeting on Thursday, February 1 before going to full council when it meets on Wednesday, February 14.