Most councils overspend on child services

Figures for the 152 English councils which provide children’s social care services showed 113 – 75 per cent – spent more than they had budgeted for, while 38 spent less in 2015/16, analysis by the Local Government Association (LGA) suggested. One council did not submit any data.

Councils in England spent £8.303bn on children’s social care in 2015/16, compared with a budget figure of £7.698bn, surpassing their budgets by £605m in order to protect children at immediate risk of harm, the LGA said.

In Yorkshire’s biggest city, Leeds City Council spent £152.620m during this period, compared with a budget of £123.157m – an overspend of £29,463m.

Demand for children’s social care support rose almost 140 per cent in a decade, with more than 170,000 children subject to child protection inquiries in 2015/16, compared with 71,800 in 2005/06, the LGA data found. Over the same period, the number of children on child protection plans also increased by almost 24,000, it added. In Yorkshire there were 81,500 children who were referred to children’s social services in 2015/2016, with the highest number in Leeds – 10,745 – followed by Wakefield with 10,013.

The LGA argued the figures showed the “sheer scale of the funding crisis” faced in children’s social care, as it warned of a £2bn funding gap expected by 2020.

Resources were being used to provide urgent assistance for children and families, leaving “very little” to invest in early intervention, it said.

Coun Richard Watts, chairman of the LGA’s Children and Young People Board, said services for the care and protection of vulnerable children were now, in many areas, “being pushed to breaking point”.

He said: “The fact that the majority of councils are recording high levels of children’s services overspend in their local areas shows the sheer scale of the funding crisis we face in children’s social care, both now and in the near future.”