Committee to examine £5.9 million overspend in council’s Children’s Services for first eight months of year

Members of the Safeguarding, Communities & Wellbeing Scrutiny Committee will examine the reasons why Children’s Services are reporting an overspend of £5.9m for eight months of the financial year.

The broad issue of the overspend recently surfaced during public budget discussions, where questions were raised by Cllr Dana Davies over who ‘signed it off’. Last month when the budget was discussed again the matter raised where Cllr Davies referred to an £8m overspend figure – substantially more than in the report before councillors next week.

At the time she queried why demand had increased at Children’s Services by 60% but costs had gone up by 250%, but had no firm answer publicly but was invited to correspond in private , and as a result the Labour group did not support the council’s budget this year.

Leader of the Council Mark Pritchard stated in that meeting, “I would rather have money taken out of reserves to protect the young children of Wrexham and put them into care and make sure that in a safe environment, than not spending that money.”

Cllr Pritchard has also told us today, “I am disappointed that the Labour Party and the Group Leader did not support the budget that included £3.5m into Children’s Services. They need to look in the mirror and see what reflection comes back. It is unacceptable to play politics with Children’s Services.”

More detail on the situation in the report before the committee on Wednesday next week, with it noted that as of month 8 in the financial year the overall Social Care Budget was predicting a spend of £64.956 million against a budget of £59.680 million- an overspend of nearly £5.276 million.

The reason for that overspend is explained, “Pressures within Children’s Services have been the reason for this in-year overspend with the children’s budget overspent by £5.9 million as at month 8 (November 2020).”

The sub-reason for that overspend is attributed to three areas; placements, agency staffing costs and legal costs.

The costs of placements for children within the care of the authority are described as “escalated” with the council’s budget for out-of-county placements showing a predicted overspend of £5.6 million as at the end of month 8.

Much like previously in the Environment Dept, legacy use of agency staff has been pointed to as a reason for overspends with it noted, “Agency use within the Department has been at over 50 agency members of staff consistently during the course of 2020/21 within children’s services. Regionally and nationally there is a high instance of use of agency staffing however we have established plans to reduce the numbers of agency staff in post over the next two quarters”

The reason for agency staff is explained, “Agency staff have been used where recruitment has been difficult, where we have seen a specific demand increase requiring an immediate response, and where we are catching up/clearing backlogs within our work.”

There is a light overview of the £450k ‘increase in the legal costs associated with managing the number of cases subject to legal proceedings’, along with an an increase in cases which required ‘specialist barrister support’

As with most things the pandemic has also affected service provision, including delays in the development of move on accommodation for children leaving care and restricted expansion in in-house foster placements. Councillors will likely probe the ‘increased need within communities’ and how the pandemic has increased dependency on high cost external placements.

Data on placements is given, with numbers increasing every quarter for last 5 quarters (since October 2019), with it noted “There is a lack of placement capacity within internal foster carer provision which has in turn created an over reliance on IFAs (Independent Fostering Agencies). Each individual placement with an IFA is more costly.”

Since the end of Quarter 4 of the last financial year there has been an increase in external fostering placements from 68 to 100 and in residential placements from 14 to 23, with it explained, “Overall demand has increased because the numbers of children leaving Care has been reducing.”

The combined increase in cost per week across both areas is £75,239 per week.

The council’s financial response is detailed, with the recent budget allocating an additional £3.5m for the department in 2021-22, with it noted: “This will be allocated to cover those areas currently under pressure and schemes which can demonstrate that they can reduce pressures and areas of current overspend.”

Several practical actions are listed including:

• Increasing number of Local Authority foster carers and supported lodging hosts – incentivised via the council tax reduction promotion and the like.
• 3 new foster carers have been recruited in last six months and 13 supported lodging hosts have been recruited in last six months
• Targeted recruitment campaigns to both fill vacant post and recruit to long term agency posts to reduce agency staff use
• Expansion of in-house legal team to reduce external costs.

Councillors are told, “There is a clear awareness within children’s services that there is a need to manage all aspects of budget as effective as possible whilst ensuring the safety of all children in Wrexham.”

Members of the committee will form up recommendations based off what they hear at the meeting next week.

Top pic: The meeting will be on Zoom, rather than in the usual committee room.