In 2019, under the Conservatives, Children’s Services had a £1.6m surplus, however, in just five years, the Council’s Labour-Independent administration has accrued Special Needs debts of £90m, which if not addressed will rise to £1.2billion by 2031. This year alone, interest costs on the debt are £6m.
It’s recognised that the rising costs of Special Needs is an issue for all Councils following the pandemic, rising costs and inflation, but Cheshire East Council is a national ‘outlier’ with levels of debt described by Government as “unprecedented”!
We heard at the Children and Families Committee earlier this week, that CEC’s debt mitigation programme, (following their invitation to join the Government’s Safety Valve Programme), claims to be able to make nearly £1b savings over the next seven years, but admits that they can’t demonstrate how to reduce the £248m historic deficit.
Their high-level, programme objectives are aspirational, but lack the essential detail of how, exactly, savings will be achieved, and many progress measures have not yet been developed.
Proposed new special needs schools are years away from delivery, and mechanisms for equitable SEN assessment, such as utilising the SEND Toolkit or the Assessment Banding methodology, are not yet “embedded” across the multi-agency system.
Of course, the real “elephants in the room”, (that were asked at the Committee and that were not satisfactorily answered), are;
‘How did high needs plans (EHCPs) rise by 18% last year (compared to national averages of just 9%)?
This replicates a year on year trend over the previous five years, which begs the question,
“How was the debt permitted to develop to such unprecedented levels without corrective action?
If we don’t understand the mechanisms by which the Council accrued this unprecedented debt, we can’t have confidence that CEC can control it.
The Department of Education has understandably held back, at this time, on providing more public monies to ‘bail the Council out’ without evidence of a sustainable way forward.
Instead they have asked CEC to work directly with them, to develop robust strategies to comply with entry to the Safety Valve Programme, without which, this unprecedented debt threatens the viability not just of children’s services but of the whole Council."
REFERENCE
https://moderngov.cheshireeast.gov.uk/ecminutes/documents/s116729/Appen…
