While the attention this week has been on local government reorganisation, East Sussex County Council has been looking at ways to balance its budget, including taking an extra £10m from reserves.
The figures were set out in a monitoring report looking back at the second quarter of the year which was considered by the council’s cabinet on Tuesday December 10. According to the report, the council expects a total overspend of £24.2m by the end of the financial year.
While the overall impact is expected to be mitigated by other elements of the budget, the overspend is expected to result in an unplanned draw of £10.5m from the council’s financial management reserve in 2024/25.
This is in addition to the planned draw of £14.3m, which has already been agreed.
Overspends and underspends
Council leader Keith Glazier (Conservative) told the meeting the financial position remained challenging. “The total forecast revenue overspend for services is £24.2m. It was £23.4m at quarter one – an increase of £800,000 due to the forecast overspend in children’s services of £13.9m thanks to the pressure of early help and social care, and homes to school transport. Also projecting overspends are adult social care at £10m and business services at £800,000, while communities, economy and transport are forecast to underspend by £600,000.”
Lobbying the government
This financial position saw concerns raised by David Tutt, leader of the council’s Liberal Democrat group. “I think you’ve perhaps become master of the understatement when you say the financial situation is challenging. It is dire, let’s be honest. We have worked together and will continue to work together to lobby government, but I think we all have a shared nervousness to what we may or may not get from the £700m that is going to be used to target areas of deprivation.”
Labour’s Trevor Webb made a similar point on lobbying saying the government was aware of the county’s areas of deprivation and argued they could be set to benefit from a share of the government fund mentioned by Cllr Tutt. “I can assure people that the Labour group on East Sussex County Council have been strenuously lobbying … and we have been made assured that Stephen Kinnock, the minister for care, was aware of the areas of deprivation in Hastings and throughout East Sussex and that is going to be one of the areas of deprivation which could be in that budget.”
Taking responsibility
Godfrey Daniel, another Labour councillor, struck a somewhat different chord, however. “What actually does surprise me is the lack of political responsibility for this budgetary crisis. I think we have to recognise that for the last 14 years local government has been hollowed out. The sooner that the politicians running this council actually accept that, then I think we’ll be on stronger ground to make lobbying claims for the future. The mess we’ve got into is of your making. If you are going to lobby the government then make sure you actually confront the situation that the Conservative government let down local government.”
Cllr Daniel’s comments prompted criticism from Cllr Glazier. “I can’t remember one occasion over the last four years when we haven’t written to the government of the day explaining that there is not enough money in the local government settlement. I join Cllr Webb’s optimism that we or he has been able to convince his colleagues in the government that Hastings and other areas in East Sussex has significant deprivation which needs considering under that other £700m, but we can only hope on that. Early indications are that actually it won’t go to many county councils. We could be significantly worse off than we had expected.”