Draft Budget 2025-26 Proposals

Overview

We need your views on the Council’s budget for the financial year 2025/26.

We are asking for you to complete this consultation as it will help shape our financial priorities and deliver value for money for our residents, businesses, and communities. The Council’s draft budget report for 2025/26 includes key saving and growth revenue proposals, an update on the Council’s capital programme, and the Fees and Charges Schedule.

This budget has been created to support our Council Plan commitments, to create a Greener, Safer and Fairer borough for all residents to enjoy.

It is very important that our residents and businesses have a say on this draft budget to help to ensure the Council delivers the Council Plan priorities and set a balanced budget for 2025/26.

It is a statutory requirement for a Council to set a balanced budget, which requires all income generated from government grants, council tax, business rates and investments, alongside savings plans, to be equal to all expenditure by the Council. This ensures that the Council is operating in a sustainable and manageable way. The budget growth and savings included in the proposals are measured in this way to ensure they all contribute to achieving our community standards. If the Council’s budgeted expenditure exceeds the budgeted income in that year, it results in a budget gap which will need to be closed.

The proposals have also been reviewed against an equalities impact assessment, which is summarised in a separate report. This evaluates the impact each proposal has on our residents and community in upholding the principle of fairness.

The consultation period for all documents will be running from 14 November – 10 January, and we encourage responses from all during this time.

How can you get involved?

We are keen to get your views and feedback on the consultation. It only takes a few minutes to complete our consultation survey, and your views will help to inform our budget decision-making.

Background

The Council has forecasted two budget scenarios over the next four years to anticipate potential changes to funding. ‘Scenario One’ assumes that £9m of additional funding for Adult Social Care does not continue beyond 2024/25, and the Council’s Settlement Funding Allocation (which includes a general revenue grant from central government and retained business rates) is frozen. This results in a budget gap of £23.5m before any budget reductions for 2025/26, and after budget reductions a gap of £9.4m. ‘Scenario Two’ assumes that additional Adult Social Care funding continues and that the Settlement Funding Allocation is uplifted for inflation, resulting in a budget gap of £14m before budget reductions for 2025/26, and a balanced budget after reductions. Officers consider Scenario Two the much more likely scenario, in line with assumptions boroughs are taking elsewhere in London.

Assuming that the Council achieves a balanced budget for 2025/26, ‘Scenario One’ also forecasts a cumulative budget gap of £18.8m by 2028/29, whereas ‘Scenario Two’ forecasts a cumulative gap of £14.4m by 2028/29.

The bulk of this pressure relates to increases in demand for our services, particularly temporary accommodation and increased demand for children’s and adult’s care. During this challenging financial backdrop, it is essential the Council delivers value for money for residents, and these proposed budget savings aim to save money without reducing the quality of the services the Council provides to our residents.

This consultation focuses on the budget for 2025/26 that is due to be agreed by Full Council in February 2025 and the proposals for which we are seeking your feedback on, breakdown into four main types:

• Budget Pressures/Growth – proposed increased budget in 2025/26 to fund increased service provision
• Budget Reductions – proposed cost reductions and additional income for 2025/26. These savings are required to achieve a balanced budget for 2025/26. Any savings not taken forward will need to be replaced with alternatives on a £ for £ basis as the Council is required to set a balanced budget
• Capital proposals – Proposed capital projects
• Fees and Charges  

An Equalities Impact Assessment (EqIA) Summary Report – details individual equality reviews of each proposal to measure their impact on residents and the community.

The below proposals are split between the revenue and capital budgets. The revenue budget refers to day-to-day expenditure and income for the Council, such as service delivery and staff costs, whereas capital budgets refer to expenditure used to acquire assets for the long-term functionality of the Council (includes physical assets and cash assets).

Revenue Proposals

Below are a few key proposed savings (all proposed savings can be seen in the budget proposals):

• £400,000 saving relating to Adult Social Care service users in prevention initiatives to support more independent living and provide more sustainable long-term solutions for care
• £300,000 saving by reducing SEND transport spend by providing more local school places for children with SEN and increasing independent travel training
• £2,800,000 increase in income by using parking and enforcement income to pay towards cost of borough’s recycling service
• £8,700,000 relating to staff savings across the Council
• £500,000 for enabling services and process reviews
• £725,000 additional income from expanding advertisement opportunities across the borough
• £150,000 by enhanced customer relationship management and digital functionality of the Council website

Below are a few key proposed areas of growth (all growth can be seen in the budget proposals):

• £466,000 invested into mitigating Adult Social Care demographic pressures
• £1,000,000 forecasted pressures from increased users and costs within Children’s Services
• £2,500,000 for supporting increased numbers of people using temporary accommodation
• £705,000 to make Street Wash crews a permanent part of the budget
• £150,000 relating to cyber security investment for Council assets

A summary of each of the budget areas above is listed by service area below:

• Adult Social Care and Public Health
• Chief Executive  
• Children’s Services  
• Environment and Neighbourhoods   
• Housing and Social Investment   
• Resources and Customer Delivery  
• Corporate  

The full list of revenue proposals in one document

Capital Proposals  

The consultation focuses on capital proposals recommended for inclusion in the ongoing Capital Programme. Below are the key proposals included:

• Children’s and Early Years Provision (£100,000)

The proposal also includes projects which have been put forward for the Capital Pipeline. These are projects that will be developed further with a view of being moved to the main capital programme once feasible. Below are the key proposals included:

• Procurement of vehicles for the Waste and Cleansing Services Contract (£1.7m)
• Chelsea Bridge (£200,000) – Total refurbishment including electrics, metal work and carriageways. There is also a further £6m for 2025/26 and £7.7m for 2026/27
• Temporary Accommodation (£6m) – Rolling programme to acquire new housing units.
• Potential Property Acquisitions for Housing Needs (£9m)

Please download and view the full document outlining the capital proposals.

Fees and Charges

The fees and charges include services provided by the Council ranging from leisure to commercial waste services and highways to planning services amongst other chargeable services. Proposed increases broadly follow the two per cent recommendation with small deviations either side.

Schedule of Draft Fees and Charges 2025/26

You can find a list of fees and charges table below categorised by each department and service area with proposed changes for 2025/26. Any significant deviations to this percentage are set out in the exceptions document below.

Fees and Charges Schedule – Exceptions

Why your views matter

We’d really appreciate it if you can spend a few minutes to complete our consultation survey. Your views at this stage will help to inform our budget decision-making.

If you need help to complete this survey, or need it in an alternative format please email Financial.Strategy@rbkc.gov.uk