Hampshire County Council faces £82m funding gap
Research by UNSION found it to be the biggest in the south-east region for 2024/25
Last updated 2nd Oct 2023
UNISON research shows that Hampshire County Council has the biggest funding gap in the South East region, with a £82 million hole for 2024/25.
The research “Councils Under Pressure” shows nearly 40 councils in the region are over £1 million short of their planned spending requirements.
According to UNISON’s research, Hampshire County Council leads the list with £82 million short of its spending needs for next year, followed by Medway Council with a gap of nearly £40 million.
The record combined shortfall totals almost £350 million across the seventy councils in the South East for 2024/25.
The County Council ran a public consultation in the summer to gather residents’ opinions on their financial strategy for budget management until April 2025.
HCC received 2,935 responses. Of that, 60% of respondents agreed with the County Council’s financial strategy. Notably, 54% of responders supported increasing existing service charges, and 47% agreed to introduce new charges for currently free services.
The programme included a wide range of proposals that would allow the Council to increase its savings and bridge the financial gap.
Plans involve raising Council Tax by over 4.99%, continuing use of the reserves, reducing and changing non-statutory services, imposing “bare minimum levels” in those statutory services, new parking charges or cutting back on day-to-day repairs such as dealing with potholes or drainage cleansing.
County Council has identified that a total of £90.4 million could be generated through the proposals, of which £75 million is expected to be delivered by 2025/26, leaving an unmet budget gap of £57 million in 2025/26.
UNISON South East regional secretary Steve Torrance said, “Communities rely on local councils for lots of essential services: clean streets, social care for their families, fixing potholes, and public parks and leisure facilities.
“Councils are on their knees. Ministers don’t seem to care about public services or how hard local government has been hit over the years.
“Essential services can’t run on thin air. Attempting to balance the books by putting people out of work will mean even more pain.
“Unless the government intervenes with significant extra funding, those job losses and service cuts are inevitable across the country, and every family will feel their impact.”
Hampshire County Council will decide on the savings proposals at the full County Council on November 9.