Swansea Council backs draft budget proposals
People in Swansea will benefit from extra investment in council services like education and social care but council tax is still likely to rise and savings will need to be made, leaders have said
People in Swansea will benefit from extra investment in council services like education and social care but council tax is still likely to rise and savings will need to be made, leaders have said.
The council’s cabinet has approved a draft set of budget proposals for 2026-27 which will now go out for consultation before the budget is set in early March.
A lot of funding for day-to-day services comes from the Welsh Government and the council had been in line for a 3.4% rise in 2026-27 but it’s now looking like a 5.2% increase.
Council leader Rob Stewart said he welcomed the “significant help that’s available to us” at a cabinet meeting on January 9.
An important element of funding also comes from council tax but it’s not clear yet how much it could go up
Cllr Stewart said the intention was to continue with lower-than-average hikes compared to Wales’s other 21 local authorities and balance the need to invest in services with the pressures faced by residents. Council tax went up 5.95% at the beginning of the current financial year.
Like all local authorities Swansea has to set a balanced budget every year. This involves assessing the funding it’s set to receive and the financial pressures such as staff wage rises and higher social care and school transport costs, among other things.
A report before cabinet said the funding pressures were estimated to be £49.6 million next year and that this was £12.7 million more than the extra funding and higher council tax receipts coming its way.
But the £49.6 million figure could have been significantly higher had cabinet not agreed to cut its employer pension costs next year by a whopping £16.2 million.
Ben Smith, the council’s finance director, said he considered this to be the biggest single saving in the council’s history and one which reflected the good performance of the City and County of Swansea Pension Fund, which has more than doubled in value in the last decade. “It frees up an enormous amount of headroom,” he said.
The upshot is that all council departments will get more money than currently, but savings of £12.7 million – the difference between cost pressures and extra income – will be needed, including some by schools.
These savings can include income-raising measures, such as increasing burial and cremation fees, not just cuts. It’s also expected that £2 million will be saved due to lower energy costs.
Cllr Stewart said around 33p of every pound spent by the council on day-to-day services went on schools and education, with a slightly lower proportion going on social services
The rest, he said, was spent on the hundred or so other services provided.
It’s expected that schools collectively will get a net increase in funding of £12.2 million. Not for the first time, Cllr Stewart said Swansea schools had more money held in reserves than any other Welsh council, although it wasn’t spread equally. “We would like to see more of those reserves being used,” he said.
Cllr Robert Smith, cabinet member for education and learning, said he felt an “honourable set of proposals” was being offered but he added that the extra funding could not address every issue faced by schools.
The cabinet report estimated that 12 full-time equivalent posts were at risk due to the need to make savings, excluding posts at schools, but efforts would be made to minimise compulsory redundancies.
The budget proposals will be scrutinised as the public consultation continues up until February 6. Cabinet will produce a final set of budget proposals on February 19 and full council will then set the budget on March 5.