POWYS: Social Services Crisis

A financial bailout of nearly £6 million for Powys County Council’s Social Services needs to be agreed at a full council meeting.

At a meeting of the council’s Cabinet on Tuesday, November 19, director of social services and wellbeing Nina Davies outlined the scale of financial problems affecting her departments.

She explained that money transfers from both council reserves and the risk budget totalling £5.827 million need to be made.

The report explains that Adult Social Care is predicting that it will be £3.082 million over its budget of £92.688 million this year, while Children’s Social Services is expected to be £2.745 million over its budget of £30.745 million.

Mrs Davies explained that the risks that had been predicted at the beginning of the year and at the end of June had now materialised.

Mrs Davies said: “The increase in forecast expenditure is due to increased demand and pressures in residential and home care services, and costs associated with provider stability over and above what was funded.”

“We’re delivering an extra 1500 hours of home care a week.”

She added that the “complexity” of people’s needs was also increasing in services that the council are legally obliged to provide.

In Children’s Services Mrs Davies explained that unachieved savings from previous years that had been rolled forward into this year’s budget.

This meant that the department had started the year in a “challenging position.”

She stressed that any new “child or young person” taken into care from April 1 put the department into an immediate overspend position.

Mrs Davies added that the cost of placements is spiralling upwards and there is a shortage of placements across the UK.

Mrs Davies said that the numbers of children and young people in care have been “stable” for the last 12 months, but the cost of placements had increased from £6.7 million last year to £10.1 million this year.

Mrs Davies said that “budget rectification plans” have been put in place and actions include a recruitment freeze and freeze on non-essential spending.

Cabinet member for future generations, Labour’s Councillor Sandra Davies said:  “Unfortunately the placement costs are exorbitant, and we do not have any control over those.

“It is a national issue that comes down to supply and demand, and there’s high demand and low supply.

She pointed out that use of agency staff had fallen and the departments had “turned the corner” from historic bad reports.

Cllr Davies “We can’t afford to go back there, we’re in quite a good place despite the costs involved.

“Nobody likes to see increasing costs, but safety is paramount.”

Cabinet member for a connected Powys Liberal Democrat Councillor Jake Berriman said:  “The no consequence to costs is the bit I get worried about.

“While 235 children are being cared for and these are people suffering real hardship and in real need.

“A whole range of other services are being accessed by many thousands of people across Powys and we have to turn the tap off on those services as we address these budgets.”

He pointed out that a quarter of England’s local authorities could go bankrupt soon: “on the back of social care costs.”

Cllr Berriman said: “This will eat up the budget of all of our other services and in 10 years’ time we may only be doing social care and education, and that would be really distressing to me.”

He believed that central government who set the legal requirements for Social Service responsibilities should pay the “right amount” for it.

Cllr Berriman said: “This report shines a light on a problem that is crippling local government, we really need a fair (funding) settlement.”

Council leader, Liberal Democrat Councillor James Gibson-Watt said: “The lobbying between the WLGA (Welsh Local Government Association) and Welsh Government and up the M4 to Whitehall is intense.

“There’s not much else we can do but keep banging at the door with great frequency.”

Cabinet agreed to recommend to full council that the financial virement for Social Services needs to be made.