No comment from Council as report reveals Sefton is £6m over budget

A newly-published financial report suggests Sefton Council is set to overspend its 2023/24 budgets by nearly £6m.

The report to the Overview and Scrutiny Committee says that pressures to social care will result in an overspend of £5.6m across all departments.

Children’s Social Care accounts for just over £4m of the expected overspend.

Sefton Council acknowledged an invitation to comment from OTS News but did not reply further.

The 2023/24 budget had allocated an extra £21 million for Children’s Services. This added funding was earmarked for more staff, including temporary agency costs for new hires, International Social Workers, and those emerging from the social work academy. The budget also covered additional resources due to the number of service packages, expected growth, and inflationary pressures.

The staffing cost forecast indicates it will mostly align with the set budget, as the impact of the new hiring initiatives starts to show. However, the forecast depends on several assumptions, such as the timeline for existing managed/project teams exiting as new staff come onboard. Any change in these assumptions will lead to a revision of the forecast.

Some accommodation and support packages are expected to exceed their budgets. This is partially due to the addition of new packages in late 2022/23 and early 2023/24, which initially were more expensive. However, there has been a recent positive trend, with children being placed in more cost-effective, appropriate settings.

• Adult Social Care: Forecast to break even, but facing pressures due to increased provider fees and demand. Efficiencies and savings of £5.7m are planned.
• Children’s Social Care: Forecast overspend of £4.059m, influenced by staffing costs, accommodation, and support packages. Improvements in placement practices and ongoing reviews might reduce costs.
• Corporate Resources: Forecasting balanced budget but facing pressures from ICT contracts and loss of income from School SLAs.
• Economic Growth and Housing: Balanced but with potential overspends.
• Education Excellence: Forecasting £0.473m overspend due to additional SEND staff.
• Operational In-House Services: Potential overspend of £0.236m, mainly in Catering and security service.
• Additional Pay Award Provision: The budget underestimated the pay award increase, resulting in an additional £1.5m expenditure.

The report says that: “Additional work will be undertaken across service areas to refine the forecasts and identify mitigating efficiencies to ensure each service achieves a
balanced budget position. In Children’s Social Care forecasts will be refined to take into account the improvements in practice that have seen children being placed in
more appropriate settings, as well as the anticipated reduction in the number of Looked After Children”.