Growth/demand pressures
Adult social care
Like all authorities across the country, the provision of support for Adult Social Care has provided a considerable financial challenge to Surrey County Council. This has only been partly offset by the introduction of the Adult Social Care precept which has allowed an additional council levy of 2% to be added to bills each year ringfenced for this specific area of expenditure.
With significant increases in the elderly population and the complexity of needs, major pressures are currently around the cost of care package commitments, contract inflation and workforce pressures.
Children’s services
Similarly, like many authorities across the country, the provision of support for children with additional needs continues to be one of the biggest challenges and pressure for Surrey. Much of the cost is met through the high needs block of the dedicated schools grant (DSG), whilst the staffing pressures relating to assessments, management and associated transport costs cause pressures in the general fund.
The largest areas of pressure currently relate to the cost of home to school travel assistance, which links to the significant growth in the number of children with additional needs and disabilities in specialist provision and the statutory transport requirements for those children. Increased costs of social care placements account for the majority of the remaining pressures.
In addition, the costs of social care placements continue to be a budget pressure across the MTFS period. Although the number of children in care has fallen, the cost of very specialist placements continues to rise, in a highly-competitive commercial market.
These demand pressures on social care and general inflationary pressures have been built into the MTFS assumptions within each Surrey council’s budget.
Homelessness & impact of changes to Homelessness Prevention Grant (HPG) distribution
The formula for allocating HPG is being updated from 2026-27 as part of the upcoming spending review. The proposed changed will redistribute funding away from Surrey and indicate the likely shift of funding which will occur through Fair Funding Reform.
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