2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown
Service Description	Employee Expenditure	Other Expenditure	Total Expenditure	Income From Fees, Charges & Rents	Other Income	Government Grants	Total Income	Total Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)
Service Description	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Families, Children & Wellbeing	53.563	82.278	135.840	(2.012)	(4.606)	(50.915)	(57.532)	78.308	25.883	104.191
Homes & Adult Social Care	46.069	179.942	226.011	(33.306)	(22.747)	(48.140)	(104.193)	121.818	8.013	129.831
City Operations	58.397	66.453	124.849	(68.366)	(5.734)	(2.235)	(76.335)	48.514	24.864	73.378
Corporate Support Functions	28.904	20.187	49.091	(13.183)	(1.577)	(1.906)	(16.667)	32.424	(22.122)	10.302
Service Areas Total	186.932	348.859	535.792	(116.867)	(34.664)	(103.197)	(254.728)	281.064	36.638	317.702
Centrally Managed Budgets	2.821	104.701	107.523	(1.786)	(4.968)	(111.442)	(118.196)	(10.673)	(42.210)	(52.883)
General Fund Total	189.754	453.561	643.315	(118.653)	(39.632)	(214.639)	(372.924)	270.391	(5.572)	264.819
Dedicated Schools Grant Funded (DSG)	157.743	87.764	245.507	(1.576)	-	(244.987)	(246.563)	(1.056)	1.056	-
Housing Revenue Account (HRA)	27.179	48.779	75.958	(80.287)	(0.187)	-	(80.474)	(4.516)	4.516	-
BHCC Revenue Total	374.676	590.104	964.779	(200.515)	(39.819)	(459.626)	(699.960)	264.819	-	264.819

Budget changes from 2024/25 to 2025/26
	2024/25 Revised Base	Internal Transfers	Reversals of One Off Allocations	Inflation	Service Pressures	Commitments & Reinvestment	VFM & Other Savings	2025/26 Original Budget	Change Over Revised Base	Change Over Revised Base
	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	%
Families, Children & Wellbeing	72.460	0.009	-	2.549	6.777	(1.029)	(2.458)	78.308	5.848	8.07
Homes & Adult Social Care	122.540	(0.261)	-	5.311	8.391	(4.907)	(9.256)	121.818	(0.722)	(0.59)
City Operations	47.313	(0.641)	(0.200)	1.281	6.165	(3.622)	(1.782)	48.514	1.201	2.54
Corporate Support Functions	29.482	(0.332)	-	0.757	2.378	1.430	(1.291)	32.424	2.942	9.98
Total Directorate Spending	271.795	(1.225)	(0.200)	9.898	23.711	(8.128)	(14.787)	281.064	9.269	3.41
Housing Benefit Subsidy	0.399	-	-	-	0.300	-	-	0.699	0.300	75.19
Bulk Insurance Premia	3.764	0.373	-	0.061	-	0.150	-	4.348	0.584	15.52
Capital Financing Costs	7.997	-	-	-	-	4.631	-	12.628	4.631	57.91
Corporate VFM Savings	(2.598)	1.382	-	(0.072)	-	-	(1.002)	(2.290)	0.308	(11.86)
Contingency and Risk Provisions	0.924	(1.447)	(0.500)	0.023	-	3.408	-	2.408	1.484	160.61
Unringfenced Grants	(32.150)	-	-	-	-	2.962	-	(29.188)	2.962	(9.21)
Levies to External Bodies	0.242	-	-	0.007	-	-	-	0.249	0.007	2.89
Other Corporate Budgets	(4.389)	0.952	-	(0.103)	-	0.100	-	(3.440)	0.949	(21.62)
NET REVENUE EXPENDITURE	245.984	0.035	(0.700)	9.814	24.011	3.123	(15.789)	266.478	20.494	8.33
Contributions to/ from(-) reserves	0.371	(0.035)	1.063	-	-	(3.058)	-	(1.659)	(2.030)	(547.17)
BUDGET REQUIREMENT	246.355	-	0.363	9.814	24.011	0.065	(15.789)	264.819	18.464	7.49
Funded By:
Revenue Support Grant	8.453							8.789	0.336	3.97
Business Rates Local Share	54.152							60.519	6.367	11.76
BRR Tariff/top up	1.648							1.666	0.018	1.09
Business Rates Collection Fund surplus/(deficit)	(1.816)		0.363					(1.575)	0.241	(13.27)
Council Tax Collection Fund surplus/(deficit)	(1.174)							(2.204)	(1.030)	87.73
Council Tax	185.092							197.624	12.532	6.77
Total	246.355		0.363					264.819	18.464	7.49

`* £1.002m of Public Health savings are shown against Corporate VFM Savings in this table but are included in the Families, Children & Wellbeing savings totals on pages 10 & 25.

Specific Government Grants 2025/26
Department	Grant	Budget 2025/26
Department	Grant	£m
Families, Children & Wellbeing
Commissioning & Communities	MHCLG - PFI Grant	(1.505)
Commissioning & Communities	DfE - Funding for 6th Form Students	(0.147)
Commissioning & Communities	DfE - ESFA Adult Safeguarded Learning	(0.570)
Commissioning & Communities	DFE- ESFA Multiply	(0.320)
Commissioning & Communities	DWP - Flexible Support Fund	(0.119)
Commissioning & Communities	MHCLG -Domestic Abuse Capacity Building Fund	(0.787)
Commissioning & Communities	MHCLG - H4U scheme Thankyou payments	(0.650)
Commissioning & Communities	Home Office - Asylum Seekers	(0.250)
Education & Learning	DfE - LA PFI Revenue Payments	(2.390)
Education & Learning	DfE - Other Grants	(0.010)
Education & Learning	DfE - Holiday Activities and Food Grant	(0.915)
Family Help & Protection	MHCLG - Social Care Grant	(7.572)
Family Help & Protection	MHCLG - Children’s Social Care Prevention Grant	(0.717)
Family Help & Protection	DHSC - Asylum Seekers	(3.288)
Family Help & Protection	MoJ - Youth Justice Board Remand grant	(0.070)
Family Help & Protection	MoJ - Youth Justice Board General Funding	(0.257)
Family Help & Protection	MHCLG - Children’s and Families Grant (consolidation)	(2.141)
Family Help & Protection	MHCLG - Parental Conflict Grant	(0.035)
Public Health	DHSC - Ring-fenced Public Health Grant	(24.298)
Public Health	PH - Rough Sleepers Drug and Alcohol Treatment Grant	(0.741)
Public Health	OHID - Supp Sub Misuse and Treatment Recovery Grant	(3.613)
Public Health	OHID - Sec31 Individual Placement Support Grant	(0.119)
Public Health	OHID - Stopping the Start Smoking Grant	(0.402)
Families, Children & Wellbeing Total		(50.915)
Homes & Adult Social Care
Adult Social Care	DHSC - Local Reform Community Voice Grant	(0.107)
Adult Social Care	MHCLG - Social Care Grant	(15.753)
Adult Social Care	MHCLG - Local Authority Better Care Grant	(9.665)
Adult Social Care	DHSC - War Pensions Grant	(0.022)
Adult Social Care	MHCLG - Market Sustainability and Improvement Fund	(4.470)
S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust (SPFT)	DHSC - Local Reform Community Voice Grant	(0.051)
S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust (SPFT)	MHCLG - Social Care Grant	(4.257)
S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust (SPFT)	MHCLG - Local Authority Better Care Grant	(2.004)
S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust (SPFT)	MHCLG - Market Sustainability and Improvement Fund	(0.905)
Housing People Services	MHCLG - Homeless Prevention Grant	(10.907)
Homes & Adult Social Care Total		(48.140)
City Operations
City Infrastructure	DfT - Cycle Training Grant	(0.060)
City Infrastructure	DfT - Bus Service Operators Grant (BSOG)	(0.173)
City Infrastructure	DFT - LEVI Capability Fund	(0.194)
City Infrastructure	DfT - Bus Service Improvement Plan	(0.197)
Environment & Culture	DEFRA - Natural England High Level Steward	(0.060)
Environmental Services	MHCLG - PFI Grant	(1.550)
City Operations Total		(2.235)
Corporate Support Functions
Finance & Property	DWP - Housing Benefit Admin Grant	(1.025)
Finance & Property	DWP - Discretionary Housing Payment	(0.646)
Finance & Property	DWP - HB Non-Subsidy Grants	(0.206)
Finance & Property	DWP - Verify Earnings and Pensions Alerts	(0.017)
Governance & Law	Office of National Statistics Grant	(0.004)
People & Innovation	ESFA - Apprenticeship Service Funding	(0.009)
Corporate Support Functions Total		(1.906)
Centrally Managed Budgets
Centrally Managed Budgets	MHCLG - New Homes Bonus Scheme Grant	(1.014)
Centrally Managed Budgets	MHCLG - S31 Business Rates Retention scheme grants	(25.101)
Centrally Managed Budgets	MHCLG - Employer National Insurance Contributions Grant	(2.573)
Centrally Managed Budgets	DWP - Household Support Grant	(0.500)
Housing Benefit Subsidy	DWP - Housing Benefit Rent Allowance Subs	(51.834)
Housing Benefit Subsidy	DWP - Housing Benefit Rent Rebate Subsidy	(30.420)
Centrally Managed Budgets Total		(111.442)
General Fund Total		(214.639)
Dedicated Schools Grant Funded (DSG)
Dedicated schools Grant (DSG)	DfE - Pupil Premium Grant	(9.024)
Dedicated schools Grant (DSG)	DfE - Funding for 6th Form Students	(3.046)
Dedicated schools Grant (DSG)	DfE - Dedicated Schools Grant	(231.645)
Dedicated schools Grant (DSG)	DfE - Universal Infant Free School Meals	(1.228)
Dedicated schools Grant (DSG)	DfE - Core School Budget Grant	(0.044)
Dedicated Schools Grant Funded (DSG) Total		(244.987)
BHCC Total		(459.626)

Investment to support Corporate Plan Commitments and Service Pressures 2025/26
Priority Supported	Proposed Corporate Plan Investments	Recurrent Investment 2025/26
Priority Supported	Proposed Corporate Plan Investments	£m
A City to be Proud of	Concessionary Fares Scheme	0.700
	Public Transport (School Bus Routes)	0.050
	Freeze of Parking Charges and changing usage	2.095
	Bulky Waste and Street Cleansing	0.328
	Collections - Bin Replacements	0.260
	Economic Development support	0.041
	Tree Management including Basal Roots	0.234
	New Food Waste Collection & Collections Review	1.210
	City Operations Services – Public Realm	0.250
	Total Investments - A City to be Proud of	5.168
A Fair and Inclusive City	Housing - Emergency Accommodation	1.553
	Housing - Temporary Accommodation	0.054
	Rough Sleeping Prevention Services	0.146
	Total Investments - A Fair & Inclusive City	1.753
A Healthy City where People Thrive	Children's Agency Placements	0.128
	Children's Disability Placements	1.431
	Home to School Transportation	1.078
	Children's Direct Payments and S17 Payments	0.500
	Increased SEN investment	2.660
	Family Hub preventative services	0.299
	Educational Services and Support	0.481
	Unaccompanied Asylum Seekers - Care Leavers	0.200
	Adults with Learning Disabilities (incl. Transitions)	2.997
	Community Care - Physically Disabled 18-64	0.394
	Community Care - Physically Disabled 65+	1.085
	Community Care - Memory & Cognition	1.523
	Community Care - Mental Health	0.080
	Occupational Therapy Services	0.125
	Loss of Housing Benefit Subsidy grant	0.300
	Total Investments - A Healthy City	13.281
A Responsive Council with Well-run Services	Adult Social Work Staffing - Pay Revision	0.332
	Provision for downturn in Planning Fees	0.738
	Corporate Landlord costs including Reactive Maintenance and Building Security	0.987
	Increased Business Rates on council properties	0.400
	Increased Estates costs and service charges	0.289
	Microsoft licencing increases	0.236
	New External Audit 5-Year Contract	0.253
	Maintaining the Schools IT&D Traded Service	0.326
	Loss/withdrawal of funding (various)	0.231
	Other net pressures (various)	0.017
	Total Investments to maintain Well-Run Services	3.809
	TOTAL COUNCIL PLAN INVESTMENTS	24.011

Summary of Directorate Budget Plans
Unit	Savings Proposals 2025/26	Total 2025/26 Posts Deleted
Unit	£m	FTE
Commissioning and Communities	0.783	8.5
Education and Learning	0.112	1.0
Family Help and Protection	1.563	1.9
Public Health	1.002	10.0
Families, Children and Wellbeing Total	3.460	21.4
Adult Social Care	5.532	7.5
S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust (SPFT)	1.068	-
Commissioning and Partnerships	0.136	-
Housing People Services	2.520	1.4
Homes & Investment	-	-
Homes and Adult Social Care Total	9.256	8.9
City Infrastructure	0.588	4.5
Environment and Culture	0.388	-
Environmental Services	0.303	1.0
Place	0.393	2.6
Digital Innovation	0.110	-
City Operations Total	1.782	8.1
Cabinet Office	0.100	1.0
Corporate Leadership Office	-	-
Finance and Property	0.655	8.5
Governance and Law	0.132	3.2
People and Innovation	0.289	4.9
Contribution to Orbis	0.115	-
Corporate Support Functions Total	1.291	17.6
Centrally-held Budgets Total	-	-
Grand Total	15.789	56.0

`* £1.002m of savings shown against Public Health in this table are included in the Corporate VFM Savings totals on page 4.

Summary of Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30
	Profiled Payments 2025/26	Profiled Payments 2026/27	Profiled Payments 2027/28	Profiled Payments 2028/29	Profiled Payments 2029/30
	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Approved Schemes
Families, Children & Wellbeing	10.262	1.419	-	-	-
City Operations	55.328	14.345	6.810	5.123	2.540
Homes & Adult Social Care - HRA	45.275	-	-	-	-
Homes & Adult Social Care	6.898	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500
Corporate Support Functions	14.968	0.532	-	-	-
Identified Schemes Not Yet approved
Families, Children & Wellbeing	4.700	4.650	4.600	4.600	4.600
City Operations	33.442	23.610	9.924	12.487	6.550
Homes & Adult Social Care - HRA	65.823	169.075	88.287	56.749	54.731
Homes & Adult Social Care	1.500	1.500	1.500	1.500	1.500
Corporate Support Functions	8.750	8.750	6.750	6.750	3.750
Total	246.946	224.381	118.371	87.709	74.171
Funded by:
Borrowing	129.702	164.858	77.727	49.700	41.286
Government Grants (non ringfenced)	18.446	13.731	8.900	8.900	8.900
Government Grants (ringfenced)	52.816	9.074	2.530	2.282	2.180
External Contributions	1.358	3.270	2.050	0.467	-
Capital Receipts	25.768	15.170	8.550	7.404	2.500
Capital Reserves	0.222	-	-	-	-
Specific Reserves	1.560	1.000	1.000	1.000	1.000
Direct Revenue Funding	0.625	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500
Revenue contribution to capital (HRA self financing)	16.449	16.778	17.114	17.456	17.805
Total Funding	246.946	224.381	118.371	87.709	74.171
Funding Shortfall	-	-	-	-	-

Families, Children & Wellbeing Budget Summary
2024/25 Net Expenditure / (Income)		2025/26 Budget					2025/26 Budgeted Contracted Staff
2024/25 Net Expenditure / (Income)	Service Area	Expenditure	Income	Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)	2025/26 Budgeted Contracted Staff
£m		£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	FTE
23.054	Commissioning & Communities	24.474	(6.068)	18.406	6.295	24.701	148.8
21.764	Education & Learning	12.372	(6.175)	6.197	15.338	21.535	184.7
56.031	Family Help & Protection	69.439	(15.734)	53.705	4.082	57.787	522.0
0.165	Public Health	29.555	(29.555)	-	0.168	0.168	52.8
101.015	Families, Children & Wellbeing Total (Excluding DSG)	135.840	(57.532)	78.308	25.883	104.191	908.4
-	Dedicated Schools Grant Funded (DSG)	245.507	(246.563)	(1.056)	1.056	-	134.5
101.015	Families, Children & Wellbeing Total (Including DSG)	381.347	(304.095)	77.252	26.939	104.191	1,042.8

* The budgeted FTE number for DSG does not include staff directly employed by schools.

Families, Children & Wellbeing 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown
Service Description	Employee Expenditure	Other Expenditure	Total Expenditure	Income From Fees, Charges & Rents	Other Income	Government Grants	Total Income	Total Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)
Service Description	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Commissioning & Communities
Adult Learning Disability Services	0.184	-	0.184	-	-	-	-	0.184	0.025	0.209
Children in Care	0.613	0.004	0.617	-	-	-	-	0.617	0.058	0.675
Children's Social Care Services	1.672	(0.174)	1.498	-	-	-	-	1.498	0.227	1.725
Communities	0.422	1.744	2.166	-	(0.050)	-	(0.050)	2.116	(0.175)	1.941
Community Safety	0.930	2.471	3.401	-	(0.460)	(1.687)	(2.147)	1.253	0.199	1.452
Libraries & Information Services	2.447	3.625	6.072	(0.482)	(0.020)	(1.505)	(2.007)	4.064	2.249	6.313
Other Education Services	0.549	7.499	8.048	(0.069)	(0.119)	-	(0.188)	7.860	0.152	8.012
Schools Skills & Learning	0.910	0.907	1.817	(0.037)	(0.145)	(1.156)	(1.338)	0.479	0.222	0.701
Children's Services Central Costs	0.562	0.111	0.672	(0.004)	(0.333)	-	(0.337)	0.335	3.337	3.672
Commissioning & Communities Total	8.288	16.186	24.474	(0.593)	(1.127)	(4.348)	(6.068)	18.406	6.295	24.701
Education & Learning
Early Years and Early Help	3.459	(0.228)	3.231	(1.098)	(0.055)	(0.915)	(2.068)	1.164	1.602	2.766
Other Education Services	0.894	3.624	4.518	(0.111)	(0.455)	(2.399)	(2.966)	1.553	13.295	14.848
Schools	0.060	0.053	0.113	-	-	-	-	0.113	0.017	0.130
Special Educational Needs	4.749	(0.240)	4.509	(0.005)	(1.136)	-	(1.142)	3.367	0.424	3.791
Education & Learning Total	9.162	3.210	12.372	(1.215)	(1.646)	(3.314)	(6.175)	6.197	15.338	21.535
Family Help & Protection
Children in Care	8.888	33.654	42.542	(0.032)	(0.599)	(3.358)	(3.989)	38.553	1.378	39.931
Children's Social Care Services	17.569	4.619	22.189	(0.091)	(0.447)	(10.687)	(11.225)	10.964	2.005	12.969
Early Years and Early Help	3.794	0.034	3.829	(0.062)	(0.144)	(0.035)	(0.241)	3.588	0.506	4.093
Services for Young People	0.337	0.543	0.880	(0.015)	(0.265)	-	(0.280)	0.600	0.194	0.794
Family Help & Protection Total	30.589	38.851	69.439	(0.199)	(1.456)	(14.080)	(15.734)	53.705	4.082	57.787
Public Health
Children's Public Health Programmes (5-19)	0.137	6.578	6.714	-	(0.013)	-	(0.013)	6.702	0.143	6.845
Commissioning	1.981	0.343	2.324	-	-	(24.298)	(24.298)	(21.974)	(1.108)	(23.082)
Miscellaneous Public Health Services	1.824	1.760	3.584	(0.005)	(0.226)	-	(0.231)	3.353	0.236	3.590
NHS Health Check Programmes	0.067	0.232	0.300	-	-	-	-	0.300	0.099	0.398
Obesity	-	0.390	0.390	-	-	-	-	0.390	0.053	0.443
Physical Activity	0.472	0.054	0.526	-	(0.009)	-	(0.009)	0.516	0.108	0.624
Public Health Advice	0.307	0.015	0.322	-	-	-	-	0.322	0.052	0.374
Sexual Health Services	0.140	4.744	4.884	-	-	-	-	4.884	0.211	5.095
Substance Misuse	0.596	9.915	10.511	-	(0.130)	(4.875)	(5.005)	5.506	0.376	5.882
Public Health Total	5.524	24.032	29.555	(0.005)	(0.378)	(29.173)	(29.555)	-	0.168	0.168
Families, Children & Wellbeing Total	53.563	82.278	135.840	(2.012)	(4.606)	(50.915)	(57.532)	78.308	25.883	104.191

Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown
Service Description	Employee Expenditure	Other Expenditure	Total Expenditure	Income From Fees, Charges & Rents	Other Income	Government Grants	Total Income	Total Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)
Service Description	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Dedicated Schools Grant	-	-	-	-	-	(231.645)	(231.645)	(231.645)	-	(231.645)
Early Years and Early Help	0.714	39.043	39.756	(0.025)	-	-	(0.025)	39.731	0.148	39.880
Other Education Services	0.417	0.037	0.454	(0.130)	-	-	(0.130)	0.324	0.058	0.381
Schools	151.466	19.347	170.813	(1.373)	-	(12.698)	(14.071)	156.743	0.166	156.909
Special Educational Needs	5.147	29.337	34.484	(0.048)	-	(0.644)	(0.692)	33.791	0.684	34.475
Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) Total	157.743	87.764	245.507	(1.576)	-	(244.987)	(246.563)	(1.056)	1.056	-

Families, Children & Wellbeing Budget Plan
Section & Service Area	Summary of Budget Proposal/Strategy	Delivery Risk & Impact	Savings Proposals 2025/26
Section & Service Area	Summary of Budget Proposal/Strategy	Delivery Risk & Impact	£m
Commissioning and Communities
Children's Safeguarding & Quality Assurance - Specific child protection services, the Brighton & Hove Safeguarding Children's Partnership (BHSCP) and Independent Reviewing Officers (IRO).	Through having a Pan Sussex Policies and Procedures website and an in-house practice guidance ‘One Space’ for Social Workers, it is proposed to decommission Brighton & Hove Children’s Service Policies and Procedures Website (£0.010m). £0.080m saving from a 1 FTE reduction Safeguarding and Review Service. This is a reduction in IRO staffing to chair and oversee Child Protection (CP) Conferences and Children in Care (CIC) Reviews. Additionally, other efficiencies, and seeking required contributions from partners for safeguarding services £0.033m	Risk of Social Workers not using the correct Policies and Procedures which will be mitigated through a communication strategy about the changes. Many Social Workers already use the Pan Sussex policies and all use ‘One Space’. Risk of the service not being able to carry out the statutory IRO function to monitor CIC and oversee CP Plans. This is mitigated through shared roles and maintaining lower CP and CIC numbers.	0.123
Libraries	£0.187m saving from reduction in public library services across two years, £0.069m in 2025-26 and a further £0.118m in 2026-27. Savings achieved from reduction in opening hours at Jubilee and Hove Libraries and closure of some community libraries.	Majority of savings from Libraries staff revenue budget. Full savings from April 2026. DCMS require a needs analysis and 12 week public consultation to make significant changes to statutory library services. Further time may be required to complete staff consultation and changes with 60+ individuals affected. Public interest highly likely, especially with regard to any full closures.	0.069
Libraries	£0.015m saving immediately actionable by reducing the Book Lover shop offer in Jubilee Library, currently running at a loss. Savings achieved against staffing by removing the counter and holding limited popular stock lines in the central library space.	Some public interest. Potential to redevelop space during Jubilee refurbishment planned for 2025-26. (Costs of refurb covered within PFI contract, no cost to BHCC) Supports delivery of Customer Access Review.	0.015
Libraries	£0.027m reduction in staff costs by deleting vacancies in Home Delivery Service and Libraries Manager teams. Service needs are manageable with current staffing levels.	No risk of redundancy, vacant hours. If library closures are implemented, the Home Delivery Service may have an increase in uptake to mitigate impact on those less able to travel, but this is offset by a move toward e-resources.	0.027
Safer Communities - Community Safety	To take a ‘one council’ approach to unauthorised encampments and work collaboratively to achieve efficiencies as the statutory element of this work is covered in other council directorates.	Removal of 2 FTE posts will impact upon ability to respond in a timely and effective way.	0.090
Skills & Employment - Employability Service-Supported Employment Team (Youth Employment, Youth Employment Hub and Supported Employment)	Alternative government funding programme identified to replace General Fund contribution.	Risk: Minimal as alternative funding is anticipated.	0.275
Third Sector	Replacement of a proportion of core funding for the Thriving Communities Fund with Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) funding received from developers over the period of the Medium-Term Financial Plan. The Thriving Communities Fund will therefore be maintained at the current level while the alternative funding source provides a saving to the General Fund budget.	The Community Infrastructure Levy funding will be one-off over the 4-year period of the MTFS. Therefore, other future funding sources will need to be found at the end of this period to mitigate the risk of a loss of activity.	0.184
Commissioning and Communities Total			0.783
Education and Learning
Brightstart Nursery - Bright Start, 50 places full day/year. Total budget including Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) is £0.446m. Council subsidy 23%. Located in the 40% most disadvantaged areas of the city. Average percentage of children in receipt of EYPP 27.4%. Average percentage of children living in the 0 to 20% most disadvantaged areas of the city 47.3%. Average number of disadvantaged two year olds attending who are in receipt of EYFE 10.	Efficiency saving realised from the nursery provision moving to Tarner Family Hub during 2024/25.	Bright Start moved to Tarner Family Hub in September 2024 significantly reducing the General Fund (GF) contribution. A further review will be needed in 2026/27 to understand any ongoing GF contribution required following a full year of the model.	0.085
Other Educational support - This includes Governor support, Redundancy and Asset management and Education & Traded services support	Saving in administration support as a result of school organisational changes in addition to the Organisational Redesign of Education and Learning.	Minimal risk.	0.027
Education and Learning Total			0.112
Family Help and Protection
Adoption South East (ASE) - Regional Adoption Agency	Efficiencies in Adoption South East (ASE)	ASE has identified efficiency savings of 10% which has resulted in savings for all Local Authority partners.	0.074
Agency Placements - Residential, fostering and secure placements for looked after children provided by external agencies	Project to increase the number of in-house foster placements and reduce reliance on more expensive independent provider provision is ongoing. Provision of high quality, value for money provision though contracted services with external providers supported by the children's services framework contract arrangements and preferred provider guidelines. In addition to the savings proposed, there was pressure funding provided in 2023/24 to cover anticipated increased costs for existing clients. Relationship-based social work practice and the specialist adolescence service is contributing to diverting children from the care system, and for those already in care, a stepping down to in-house and/or less expensive placements. Close scrutiny of placement costs, together with an increase in in-house foster carers is contributing to a reduction in unit costs.	Delivery Risk: This is a high cost service where the failure of effective prevention and demand management would not only impact on the achievement of cost reduction but is likely to be of corporate financial significance to the council's challenging medium term financial position. The proposals set out here assume that other identified pressures on this budget will be met across the overall budget. A small number of adolescents with very significant needs continue to place pressure on these budgets combined with a national shortage of placements. Impact on Outcomes: The council's improved practice model prevents children needing care and contributes to improved outcomes for young people. Demand management has implications for managing risk effectively to meet safeguarding requirements and statutory duties	0.824
Agency placements - disabled children - Independent and non maintained children's homes, special schools and boarding school placements	The establishment of Rainbow Lodge, a 4-5 bed in-house residential provision to reduce reliance on expensive placements is already in progress. Savings of £0.504m have already been reported for this project, anticipated to increase by a further £0.200m.	The main risk is completion of the building within timescales and the recruitment of the team for April. This is being managed through a project board.	0.200
Family Hubs including Supporting Families Grant - The Family hubs transformation completes in September 2024 with the new model in place to deliver support for children, young people and families.	Stop use of the Hollingbury and Patcham as a satellite Family Hub and find alternative users for the building to achieve economies.	Hollingbury and Patcham Family Hub is on the site of Carden Primary School and is sure start funded, the site is only used by Health Visiting.	0.015
Fostering & Adoption - Payments to in-house carers for fostered and adopted children.	Reduction in the number of adopters to support adoption payments, therefore a proportion of this budget can be released.	Payment to adopters to support adoption placements, with a reduction in the number of adoptions this reduction in budget can be absorbed.	0.050
Fostering & Adoption - Staffing teams assessing and supporting foster carers. Allowances paid to Adopters	Reduction of 0.5 FTE social work vacant post. Risk: This work is budget sensitive as placement savings rely on stable foster placements.	Risk: This work is budget sensitive as placement savings rely on stable foster placements We have seen a reduction in the number of in house carers post pandemic so this small reduction in supervising Social Work (SW) capacity is manageable	0.035
Services for children with disabilities - Residential, respite and short breaks.	Generate income and improve short break offer through external use of vacated flats at Drove Road.	Risk: Income generation target not met due to low take up of offer.	0.225
Social Work - Social work staffing teams.	Review and reduction of social work staffing across social work pods, resulting in a reduction of social workers by 1.4 FTE. This will be managed through vacancy management.	This may impact upon caseloads leading to possible adverse effect on staff retention. Could result in risk of needing to use agency social work staff with associated increased costs. As per comment on holding/reducing vacancies in SW - we currently have less children in the system so a small reduction should not adversely impact upon caseloads.	0.100
Youth Services - The Youth Led Grants Programme provides additionally funded youth activities/projects delivered by the community and voluntary sector across the city.	Cessation of the remaining Youth-Led Grants programme.	This would result in youth projects/activities not being funded, and this would impact on young people aged between 11 – 19 years (up to 25 if they have special educational needs).	0.040
Family Help and Protection Total			1.563
Public Health
Sexual Health - Care pathway for sexual dysfunction (female)	Proposed withdrawal of the council’s funding of this service.	The service will no longer continue to be delivered. This is not a service considered Public Health responsibility.	0.043
Sexual Health - Programmes supporting HIV prevention	Reduced contributions to some external organisations are proposed. These include contributions to Gscene, Mind Out, HIV fast-track cities anti-stigma, Young people sexual health services, and the Tarriff Group service.	These are all small contributions in the context of over £4.000m Sexual Health funding where the reduced contribution is not expected to significantly impact sexual health services overall but may result in some reduced activities.	0.025
Drugs and alcohol programme - GP Alcohol brief interventions	Small reduction in contribution.	Low risk in the context of nearly £5.000m investment in the overall programme.	0.014
Healthy Child Programme - Healthy Child Programme Core Service	Reduced contribution to the core service. The core health visiting checks are mandated which means roles cut from the Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust contract due to removal of this funding will only be those providing additional support such as SEND support, meaning some reduction in safeguarding activity and school nursing activity.	This is a relatively small element of the overall £5.300m NHS service and equates to a post, this may have an impact on additional support for families with babies and children awaiting diagnosis or diagnosed with special educational needs or disabilities.	0.050
Healthy Child Programme - Other services and programmes	A reduction in contribution to the Schools Programme which supports improving physical activity, healthy eating and emotional wellbeing.	Reduction means fewer settings engaging with the whole school wellbeing work.	0.005
Weight Management - Community weight management programme for children and adults - Thrive Tribe	A 10% reduction to the programme is proposed. Obesity and weight management is a key issue for prevention services including cardiovascular disease (CVD), diabetes, etc.	May have some impact on activity and availability.	0.040
Physical activity - Dance Active Event Costs	Reduced contributions to Dance Active Events and the initiatives budget are proposed.	These are all small contributions where the reduced contribution is not expected to significantly impact Physical Activity services overall but may result in some reduced activities.	0.009
Neighbourhood programmes - Warm homes, fuel poverty strategy	A reduced contribution is proposed which will reduce allocations to deprived people in Brighton & Hove.	Other programmes or funding such as Household Support Fund, Brighton & Hove Energy Services Co-op (BHESCO) and Warmth for Wellbeing with SGN should mitigate impact.	0.015
HCPH - Health promotion incl. health promotion training, workplace wellbeing, resource printing	Cessation of Health Promotion Training and the Workplace Wellbeing programme budget (currently not staffed), and 50% reduction in printing and design work.	Reduction in health promotion activities.	0.045
Staffing - Public Health Team	The proposal is to restructure the Public Health service including deleting some currently vacant posts. This will result in an approximate reduction of 10 FTE posts overall.	Long term vacancies represent 4% of the reduced posts but the remaining 12% staffing reduction will have an impact on support for commissioning and contract management, service delivery, partnerships and policy development.	0.526
Grant allocation	Public Health Grant	Proposal to repurpose £0.230m of Public Health grant uplift and direct it to General Fund preventative services	0.230
Public Health Total			1.002
Families, Children & Wellbeing Total			3.460

`* £1.002m of savings shown against Public Health in this table are included in the Corporate VFM Savings totals on page 4.

Families, Children & Wellbeing Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30
	Profiled Payments 2025/26	Profiled Payments 2026/27	Profiled Payments 2027/28	Profiled Payments 2028/29	Profiled Payments 2029/30
	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Approved Schemes
Brighton Youth Centre	0.495	-	-	-	-
New Pupil Places (Basic Need)	6.375	-	-	-	-
Universal Free School Meals	0.192	-	-	-	-
High Needs Provision Capital	3.000	1.419	-	-	-
Childcare Expansion Capital Grant	0.200	-	-	-	-
Identified Schemes Not Yet approved
Education Capital Maintenance Grant	3.700	3.650	3.600	3.600	3.600
Devolved Formula Capital Grant	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500
Structural Maintenance Contribution	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500
Total Families, Children & Wellbeing	14.962	6.069	4.600	4.600	4.600

Homes & Adult Social Care

Supporting a Better Brighton & Hove for All

The Homes and Adult Social Care directorate is a newly formed directorate since 1 January 2025. The directorate primarily contributes to the council priorities of being a fair and inclusive city, a healthy city where residents thrive and providing responsive and well-run services. Both Adult Social Care and Housing has seen regulatory inspections and ratings being re-introduced by the Care Quality Commission (for Adult Social Care) and the Regulator for Social Housing and Building Safety Regulator for Housing (for Housing).

About the Services

The Homes and Adult Social Care directorate consists of Housing and Adult Social Care services.

Housing services include:

• Council housing landlord services comprising:

o Tenancy Services, including the Travellers Service;

o Housing Repairs & Maintenance;

o Housing Investment & Asset Management;

o Increasing the supply of homes in the city.

• Regulating the quality of private sector housing.

• Providing temporary and emergency accommodation (homelessness).

• Providing supported accommodation.

• Managing the Housing Register and Allocations Policy.

Adult Social Care services include:

• Services for vulnerable adults with Care Act eligible needs including:

o Assessment and Commissioning Services.

o Carelink Out of Hours Services.

o Support for Older people including those with memory or cognition conditions;

o Support for physical and sensory disabilities;

o Mental health services in partnership with Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust;

o Services for adults with learning disability and autism from 25 years;

o Support for carers and all ancillary activities.

Note, services for adults with learning disability and autism up to 25 years old continue to be delivered through the Families, Children and Wellbeing Directorate, with delegated powers within that Directorate for budget spend for this cohort. However, the whole budget for all adult social care services, including adults with a learning disability are within scope of this strategy.

Supporting the Council’s Priorities

A city to be proud of

• Through the Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy, Adult Learning Disability Strategy, Autism Strategy, and our contribution to the Accessible City Strategy, we are supporting people to have improved lives and access to the city.

• Our commissioning always considers how we can be more sustainable and contribute towards carbon net zero. We also aim to maximise social value through our commissioning.

• Continue to develop strategies and business cases to provide genuinely affordable homes.

• Urgently address building safety and regulatory issues with clear action plans and appropriate resourcing.

• Increase participation in civic and community life through neighbourhood engagement and participatory strategies.

A Fair and Inclusive City

• Reducing health inequalities is at the heart of our Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy and one of the key priorities of Improving Lives, the Sussex wide Health and Care strategy.

• We are working with the city to develop more age and dementia friendly spaces and developing our combatting drugs strategy with Public Health.

• Through the Safeguarding Adults Board we are looking to continuously improve how we work across multiple agencies in the city to protect those most vulnerable to harm and abuse.

• Improve council housing quality and sustainability through Housing Revenue Account (HRA) investment and make better use of existing housing capacity to meet different housing needs.

A Healthy City Where People Thrive

• Activities Work and Learning is a priority within the Adult Learning Disability Strategy.

• Improve private rented housing quality and sustainability through closer working and oversight of landlords.

• Reduce homelessness and rough sleeping through our preventative approach and increased housing supply.

A Responsive Council with Well Run Services.

• We work with partners across the city to focus on the health and wellbeing of our residents. Through meticulous budget management and good governance, we aim to have resilient, safe, and effective services fit for the future.

• Improve customer contact systems throughout the service and provide more accessible information on key services for residents.

• Ensure equalities data is monitored and informs service improvement.

Medium Term Budget Strategy

The budget strategy seeks to ensure that we deliver good quality housing, good experiences when seeking housing or advice about housing as well as adult social care services that promote independence, keep people safe, and prevents the need to visit acute health settings. These delivery intentions are supported by investments and proposals of savings and mitigation against the context of increasing demand, increasing complexity, and increasing costs.

The strategy will require collaborative working across the Integrated Care System with NHS Sussex and joint management of provider sufficiency. Effective management of hospital discharge will be key to avoiding increased acuity and need for social care.

Across the Homes division, ensuring effective use of the Homeless Prevention Grant in tandem with the council’s objective of significantly increase housing supply is key to managing and preventing future demand and costs. A wide range of options and incentives to landlords and tenants are being explored and are covered in the MTFS to use every possible method of meeting demands until supply can be improved.

Transforming Services and Managing Demands

Homes:

The demand for, and cost of, temporary accommodation together with the increasing complexity of need amongst those living in temporary accommodation remains the challenge for the General Fund budget of the directorate. It is hoped that the new allocations policy, taking a more holistic approach to finding properties that supports residents to reconnect with family or friends who may live in places other than the city, will help to manage demands. Other saving and mitigation proposals include increasing our housing stock through a new wholly council-owned company as well as continuing the work of the joint venture with Hyde Housing.

The HRA budget aims to balance the priorities of the council and its tenants and leaseholders and reflects a range of council policies and programmes on customer service, repairs and planned maintenance, capital investment in housing and engagement. There are no savings required in the HRA overall, however budget pressures, in particular activities such as building health and safety compliance works, means there will be impacts on other areas of the budget in the medium term.

Adult Social Care:

The demand for services continues to grow and the complexity of need continues to increase due the continued advances in medicine and people living longer with limiting conditions. These challenges mean that the saving proposals are focused on managing demand by triaging referrals so that those who are not eligible for adult social care services are referred to organisations that can help with their identified needs; ensuring that annual reviews of service users take place so that care packages are appropriately designed to meet the current needs of residents as well as managing the annual price reviews of providers whilst finding ways to support the care workforce.

Over the last two or three decades, the funding of Adult Social Care has attracted a lot of debate. The Care Act had two parts: the first related to national minimum standards of expectations and this has been in force since 2014; the second is related to funding; ten years on and this has not been enacted. Meanwhile, the demand for services and the complexity of need continues to grow. Within the context of increasing demand and acuity of need, the council must deliver services within finite resources and therefore when determining the provision of services to meet need, it must do so in the most cost-effective way possible.

Brighton and Hove has a diverse range of providers – in-house services, not for profit providers and for-profit providers (the latter two types of providers are known as the private and independent sector). In commissioning to meet need and delivering best value, the council will provide services where the private and independent sector cannot deliver or is no more cost effective than the council; where the independent sector can support residents with good quality care at a more cost-effective cost than the council then in order to meet needs within the budget, the council will commission providers in the independent sector. This will see a considerable change in the mix of provision over the medium term.

Investment in Services

Over the 4-years, estimated cost and demand pressures of over £31million are projected across Adult Social Care services. This is in addition to provision for real terms uplifts (inflation provision) of around £16 million. Based on expected increases in Core Spending Power for local authorities of between 2% and 3% over the medium term, these costs would put the authority into financial deficit without clear plans to address costs. Adult Social Care will contribute to this effort but will need to ensure statutory duties are met.

Homelessness costs have been increasing significantly since the pandemic with only some of this being matched by increased Homeless Prevention Grant and Rough Sleeping Grants. The MTFS provides for approximately £4 million investment but as noted above, this will outstrip expected financial settlements and will therefore need to be mitigated by the transformation and savings proposals set out in the MTFS.

Service Metrics

Adult Social Care

Funded Care Service	2020/21	2021/22	2022/23	2023/24	2024/25 (Apr – Sept)
Adults receiving domiciliary care	2,369	2,162	2,060	2,216	2,052
Adults receiving residential care	801	722	736	736	671
Adults receiving nursing care	599	494	511	551	498
Adults receiving a direct payment	600	610	627	638	592
Total number of adults provided with long term funded care during the period	4,369	3,988	3,934	4,141	3,813

The data above shows a rise in the number of adults receiving long-term funded care in Brighton & Hove. This reverses the trend in recent years with Brighton & Hove now above 2022/23 levels. This is echoed across the country, and the national trend of clients in long-term support (as a % of the adult population) over the last 4 years (1.88%) has also risen in line with Brighton & Hove figures (1.78%).

However, for adults aged 18-64, Brighton & Hove (0.98%) is slightly above the England average (0.86%). This increase in demand should be considered alongside the context of increasing complexity of individual cases (inherent in the 18-64 cohort), Brighton and Hove having the highest proportion of population 18-64 in England and the consistent increase in provider unit costs.

Housing

· Housing sees approximately 3,000 homeless households each year who need help with housing. Early intervention and prevention work is reducing levels of homelessness. However, levels of demand for assistance for homeless households are unprecedented in line with national trends. Numbers of households in temporary accommodation is high but the proportion of households where homelessness is not prevented is reducing;

· Currently license 8,000 private sector homes across the city through our three licensing schemes;

· The Private Sector Housing team received 362 requests for assistance between April 2024 and December 2024;

· We are on target to achieve 90 new units of affordable council homes for 24/25;

· Annual HRA rents and service charges of £78m per year; across the last 12 months we have completed work on 848 empty homes, making over 70 homes available per month for rent; we raised over 44,650 repairs, an average of 3,722 repairs per month or 172 repairs every working day.

· Average capital programme of around £59m a year improving homes over 5 years; Proposed investment in major and planned works to council homes of £122m over the next 3 years; Proposed investment in health & safety of council homes of £35m over the next 3 years; proposed investment of £183m in new homes over the next five years to 2029/30. However, there are likely to be new urgent investment requirements during this period.

Homes & Adult Social Care Budget Summary
2024/25 Net Expenditure / (Income)		2025/26 Budget					2025/26 Budgeted Contracted Staff
2024/25 Net Expenditure / (Income)	Service Area	Expenditure	Income	Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)	2025/26 Budgeted Contracted Staff
£m		£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	FTE
90.173	Adult Social Care	144.998	(59.807)	85.191	6.147	91.338	528.2
21.606	S75 SPFT	40.507	(18.858)	21.649	0.964	22.613	60.1
4.082	Commissioning & Partnerships	7.380	(2.274)	5.106	(0.709)	4.397	60.1
13.342	Housing People Services	31.447	(22.627)	8.820	1.345	10.165	122.4
1.179	Homes & Investment	1.679	(0.627)	1.052	0.266	1.318	40.2
130.382	Homes & Adult Social Care Total (Excluding HRA)	226.011	(104.193)	121.818	8.013	129.831	811.0
-	Housing Revenue Account (HRA)	75.958	(80.474)	(4.516)	4.516	-	475.1
130.382	Homes & Adult Social Cares Total (Including HRA)	301.969	(184.667)	117.302	12.529	129.831	1,286.1

Homes & Adult Social Care 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown
Service Description	Employee Expenditure	Other Expenditure	Total Expenditure	Income From Fees, Charges & Rents	Other Income	Government Grants	Total Income	Total Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)
Service Description	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Adult Social Care
Adult Learning Disability Services	7.814	53.640	61.455	(2.645)	(2.568)	(11.322)	(16.535)	44.919	2.614	47.534
Assistive Equipment & Technology	1.764	2.752	4.516	(0.790)	(2.884)	-	(3.674)	0.842	0.243	1.085
Clients with Memory/Cognition Support	3.645	0.194	3.838	(0.838)	(0.511)	-	(1.349)	2.489	0.782	3.272
Clients with Physical Support	5.163	55.379	60.541	(10.584)	(6.263)	(18.358)	(35.205)	25.336	1.404	26.740
Clients with Sensory Support	-	0.185	0.185	(0.027)	-	-	(0.027)	0.158	0.040	0.198
Clients with Substance Misuse Support	-	0.728	0.728	(0.037)	-	-	(0.037)	0.691	0.029	0.720
Social Care Activities	11.031	0.448	11.479	(0.036)	(1.161)	(0.336)	(1.533)	9.946	0.696	10.642
Supported Accommodation	1.655	0.600	2.255	(1.393)	(0.053)	-	(1.446)	0.809	0.338	1.147
Adult Social Care Total	31.071	113.927	144.998	(16.351)	(13.439)	(30.016)	(59.807)	85.191	6.147	91.338
S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust (SPFT)
Clients with Memory/Cognition Support	-	19.544	19.544	(4.038)	(2.010)	(3.608)	(9.657)	9.887	0.255	10.142
Clients with Mental Health Support	-	16.773	16.773	(0.569)	(4.563)	(3.608)	(8.741)	8.032	0.226	8.258
Social Care Activities	3.654	0.536	4.190	-	(0.461)	-	(0.461)	3.730	0.484	4.213
S75 SPFT Total	3.654	36.853	40.507	(4.608)	(7.034)	(7.217)	(18.858)	21.649	0.964	22.613
Commissioning & Partnerships
Clients with Physical Support	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	0.000	0.000
Commissioning & Service Delivery	3.512	1.786	5.298	(0.064)	(1.139)	-	(1.203)	4.095	(0.838)	3.256
Housing Related (Supporting People)	-	1.012	1.012	(0.092)	(0.384)	-	(0.476)	0.536	0.031	0.567
Information & Early Intervention	0.134	0.141	0.274	-	(0.049)	-	(0.049)	0.225	0.073	0.298
Support To Carers	-	0.796	0.796	-	(0.546)	-	(0.546)	0.250	0.025	0.275
Commissioning & Partnerships Total	3.646	3.734	7.380	(0.156)	(2.118)	-	(2.274)	5.106	(0.709)	4.397
Housing People Services
Housing Options & Homelessness	2.812	0.098	2.910	-	(0.001)	(2.371)	(2.372)	0.538	0.327	0.865
Temporary Accommodation	3.064	24.963	28.026	(11.508)	(0.102)	(8.536)	(20.146)	7.880	0.865	8.745
Travellers Services	0.198	0.313	0.511	(0.109)	-	-	(0.109)	0.403	0.153	0.555
Housing People Services Total	6.074	25.374	31.447	(11.617)	(0.103)	(10.907)	(22.627)	8.820	1.345	10.165
Homes & Investment
Housing Management & Support	0.056	0.006	0.061	-	-	-	-	0.061	0.008	0.069
Housing Strategy & Enabling	0.271	0.007	0.278	-	(0.053)	-	(0.053)	0.225	0.027	0.252
Private Sector Housing	1.298	0.042	1.340	(0.574)	-	-	(0.574)	0.766	0.231	0.997
Homes & Investment Total	1.624	0.055	1.679	(0.574)	(0.053)	-	(0.627)	1.052	0.266	1.318
Homes & Adult Social Care Total	46.069	179.942	226.011	(33.306)	(22.747)	(48.140)	(104.193)	121.818	8.013	129.831

Housing Revenue Account (HRA) 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown
Service Description	Employee Expenditure	Other Expenditure	Total Expenditure	Income From Fees, Charges & Rents	Other Income	Government Grants	Total Income	Total Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)
Service Description	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Estate Regeneration	0.672	0.033	0.705	-	(0.014)	-	(0.014)	0.691	-	0.691
Housing Management & Support	2.826	28.926	31.751	-	(0.140)	-	(0.140)	31.611	4.516	36.127
Housing Strategy (HRA)	0.686	0.632	1.317	-	-	-	-	1.317	-	1.317
Income Involvement & Improvement	2.684	1.134	3.818	(77.023)	(0.034)	-	(77.056)	(73.238)	-	(73.238)
Property & Investment	13.254	13.355	26.609	(3.176)	-	-	(3.176)	23.434	-	23.434
Tenancy Services	7.057	4.699	11.756	(0.088)	-	-	(0.088)	11.668	-	11.668
Housing Revenue Account (HRA) Total	27.179	48.779	75.958	(80.287)	(0.187)	-	(80.474)	(4.516)	4.516	-

Homes & Adult Social Care Budget Plan
Section & Service Area	Summary of Budget Proposal/Strategy	Delivery Risk & Impact	Savings Proposals 2025/26
Section & Service Area	Summary of Budget Proposal/Strategy	Delivery Risk & Impact	£m
Adult Social Care
Adult Social Care Operations	A 4.6% staffing vacancy factor will be applied across the service to reflect and manage turnover rates of staff.	Reduces available resources to manage demands and meet statutory duties but is based on prevailing turnover rates which are currently being managed.	0.446
Assessment Team	Redesign of the Assessment Team for Community Care services including Learning Disability & services delivered under S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust.	Delivery Risk: This may well impact the ability to manage the demands and waiting times of the service and could impact on the Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection requirements.	0.073
Community Care	Increase charges for out of hours services to external partners and customers for Carelink to reflect the increase in cost to deliver the service.	Risk: A balance is required to avoid a reduction of users and increase the risk of hospital admissions.	0.100
Community Care budget funding packages of care to meet statutory responsibilities across adult care groups apart from Learning Disability and Mental Health. Services include; community support, home care, supported accommodation, residential and nursing care - Learning Disabilities	Manage uplifts of provider fees and improve commissioning practices across the service. Benchmarking placement costs in the city has indicated they are relatively high by comparison with similar areas. The aim is to improve value for money.	Delivery Risk: There is a risk of providers giving notice on services and of failure of providers in the local market. The impact on the market will be monitored.	2.357
Community Care budget funding packages of care to meet statutory responsibilities across adult care groups apart from Learning Disability and Mental Health. Services include; community support, home care, supported accommodation, residential and nursing care - Physical Support & Sensory Support	Manage uplifts of provider fees and improve commissioning practices across the service. Benchmarking placement costs in the city has indicated they are relatively high by comparison with similar areas. The aim is to improve value for money.	Delivery Risk: There is a risk of providers giving notice on services and of failure of providers in the local market. The impact on the market will be monitored.	1.856
Community Care budget funding packages of care to meet statutory responsibilities across adult care groups apart from Learning Disability and Mental Health. Services include; community support, home care, supported accommodation, residential and nursing care - Physical Support & Sensory Support	Change the model of usage of Ireland Lodge which will result in converting a proportion of the current provision to short-term This will support hospital discharge and reduce the cost of using independent sector.	This will result in the reprovision of some of current use of Ireland Lodge which could involve moving vulnerable residents to alternative provision if there were not sufficient vacant beds to deliver.	0.100
Independence at Home	Re-focus provision on discharging clients from Craven Vale and the acute hospital, resulting in the deletion of approximately 5.4 FTE of care staff posts.	Risk: This will reduce the reablement support for maintaining independence.	0.200
Learning Disabilities - Residential (Adults) - In-house Residential	A full review and reprovision of in-house residential services for Learning Disability to ensure the council only remains the provider where this is the most suitable and cost-effective solution.	Risk: Time and resources taken to provide alternative provision. This will involve expensive consultation with service users where in-house services are proposed to close.	0.400
Adult Social Care Total			5.532
S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust (SPFT)
Assessment Team	Redesign of the Assessment Team for Community Care services including Learning Disability & services delivered under S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust.	Delivery Risk: This may well impact the ability to manage the demands and waiting times of the service and could impact on the CQC inspection requirements.	0.067
Community Care budget funding packages of care, support, residential/nursing care for people suffering a functional mental illness services will include Community Support, Home Care, direct payments, supported accommodation, residential/nursing care and specialist placements - Memory and Cognition	Change the model of usage of Ireland Lodge which will result in converting a proportion of the current provision to short-term This will support hospital discharge and reduce the cost of using independent sector.	This will result in the reprovision of some of current use of Ireland Lodge which could involve moving vulnerable residents to alternative provision if there were not sufficient vacant beds to deliver.	0.100
Community Care budget funding packages of care, support, residential/nursing care for people suffering a functional mental illness services will include Community Support, Home Care, direct payments, supported accommodation, residential/nursing care and specialist placements - Mental Health Support, 527 budgeted capacity for 2024/25.	Manage uplifts of provider fees and improve commissioning practices across the service. Benchmarking placement costs in the city has indicated they are relatively high by comparison with similar areas. The aim is to improve value for money.	Delivery Risk: There is a risk of providers giving notice on services and of failure of providers in the local market. The impact on the market will be monitored.	0.863
Community Care budget funding packages of care, support, residential/nursing care for people suffering a functional mental illness services will include Community Support, Home Care, direct payments, supported accommodation, residential/nursing care and specialist placements - Mental Health Support, 527 budgeted capacity for 2024/25.	A 4.6% staffing vacancy factor will be applied across the service to reflect and manage turnover rates of staff.	Reduces available resources to manage demands and meet statutory duties but is based on prevailing turnover rates which are currently being managed.	0.038
S75 Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust (SPFT) Total			1.068
Commissioning and Partnerships
Commissioning & Contracts - Adults Commissioning & Performance Team, Executive Director Adult Services, Safeguarding Team	Managing inflationary uplifts for block-booked contracts.	Risk: There is a risk of providers giving notice on services and of failure of providers in the local market. The impact on the market will be monitored.	0.050
Commissioning & Contracts - Adults Commissioning & Performance Team, Executive Director Adult Services, Safeguarding Team	A 4.6% staffing vacancy factor will be applied across the service to reflect and manage turnover rates of staff.	Reduces available resources to manage demands and meet statutory duties but is based on prevailing turnover rates which are currently being managed.	0.086
Commissioning and Partnerships Total			0.136
Housing People Services
Homelessness & Housing Options - Housing Options	Giving households more choice by offering and promoting suitable Out of Area options where appropriate: e.g. Homefinder UK can be used to locate social housing in other parts of the country where demand is lower. Savings assume 20 households move on per year.	It costs £0.015m per year to be a member of Homefinder. Saving shown is net of this in 2025/26. Low risk that upfront costs of £0.015m will not be offset with savings if fewer moves are made. Only requires 2-3 moves to pay for itself. Risk to saving if fewer households (less than 20) take up this scheme	0.105
Homelessness & Housing Options - Housing Options	New Allocations Policy: Incentivising securing Private Rented Sector (PRS) accommodation, rather than remaining in Temporary Accommodation (TA) by remaining on the Housing Register. Assumes 200 per year. A budget for incentivising this will be required; the saving is shown net of this revenue cost.	Fewer TA placements than planned/estimated would reduce the saving. There is moderate risk but this initiative is critical to financial sustainability.	0.950
Homelessness & Housing Options - Housing Options	Use some of New Burdens grant for the TA costs of those fleeing Domestic violence.	Permissible and appropriate use of the grant. Low risk.	0.090
Homelessness & Housing Options - Housing Options	Proactively discharge duty to households in TA to properties in other parts of England where private rents are more affordable. In reality this would involve making offers in other parts of the UK. Will be focused on single person households, but not younger adults, in order to be both affordable and not retain a duty if refused [i.e. Children's Act]. Feasible to do up to 90 over the course of a financial year.	If residents decline a reasonable offer that is out of area, then they risk street homelessness.	0.600
Supported Accommodation - Rough Sleeper Commissioned services	A service redesign is proposed to be undertaken to join the commissioning teams for both Housing and Adult Service Care services which will result in efficiencies allowing the deletion of 1 FTE vacant post	Requires HR support to undertake meaningful consultation and ensure that the consolidation of this function under single leadership is effective and sustainable.	0.050
Supported Accommodation - Rough Sleeper Commissioned services	A review of the budget for commissioned supported housing to create economies and efficiencies, allowing a proportion of the budget to be released.		0.300
Temporary and Supported Accommodation - Temporary Accommodation	New initiative to incentivise landlords to do more Private Sector leasing with the council. This form of accommodation is cheaper than high cost block booked or spot purchase. Assumes £160 per month cheaper on average.	Risk: A lower than anticipated take up of the schemes which would risk the delivery of the savings.	0.060
Temporary and Supported Accommodation - Temporary Accommodation	Invest-to-save initiative for landlord incentives to pay for home improvements (Energy Performance Certificate -EPC) to house TA clients for 1-2 years. Current proposal of up to £0.007m per Landlord to enhance the EPC rating of the property in exchange for sustaining tenancy for 1-2 years.	This savings proposal will require up-front investment as set out in an Invest-to-save business case. This would be a pilot. The success is predicated on attractive grant sums and payments will be in arrears.	0.150
Temporary and Supported Accommodation - Temporary Accommodation	Partnering with private investment companies to source Temporary Accommodation properties on a long-term lease, offering a low risk long term income to investors. This will result in longer term cost certainty and supply for Temporary Accommodation (TA).	Specialist advice will need to be sought due diligence before entering into a long-term arrangement.	0.195
Travellers	Proposal for restructure of the current staffing resource.	Expected to be manageable at minimal risk.	0.020
Housing People Services Total			2.520
Homes & Adult Social Care Total			9.256

Homes & Adult Social Care - GF Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30
	Profiled Payments 2025/26	Profiled Payments 2026/27	Profiled Payments 2027/28	Profiled Payments 2028/29	Profiled Payments 2029/30
	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Approved Schemes
Knoll House Building Works	5.776	-	-	-	-
LDV On-Going Costs - Community Homes (Brighton & Hove Seaside Community Homes)	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500
Travellers Site Fund	0.502	-	-	-	-
Housing IT Strategy	0.120	-	-	-	-
Identified Schemes Not Yet approved
Better Care Funding - Capital Grant	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500
Disabled Facilities Grant (Better Care Funding) - Capital Grant	1.000	1.000	1.000	1.000	1.000
Total Homes & Adult Social Care - GF	8.398	2.000	2.000	2.000	2.000

Homes & Adult Social Care - HRA Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30
	Profiled Payments 2025/26	Profiled Payments 2026/27	Profiled Payments 2027/28	Profiled Payments 2028/29	Profiled Payments 2029/30
	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Approved Schemes
Feasibility & Design - Housing Investment	(0.027)	-	-	-	-
Windlesham Close	2.715	-	-	-	-
Doors	0.962	-	-	-	-
Solar PV City Wide	(0.800)	-	-	-	-
Fire Safety	1.500	-	-	-	-
New Build Refurbishment (Converting Spaces in Existing Buildings)	0.392	-	-	-	-
Structural Repairs	13.604	-	-	-	-
External Decorations & Repairs	0.250	-	-	-	-
House Purchase Scheme	3.129	-	-	-	-
Housing Joint Venture Purchase	(1.818)	-	-	-	-
Extended Home Purchase Scheme	2.179	-	-	-	-
Palace Place Redevelopment	2.119	-	-	-	-
Frederick Street	0.080	-	-	-	-
Rotherfield Crescent	0.963	-	-	-	-
Eastergate Road	5.886	-	-	-	-
Kubic Apartments	0.035	-	-	-	-
EICR Compliance Programme	(1.521)	-	-	-	-
Hollingbury Library	2.988	-	-	-	-
Portslade Village Centre	12.639	-	-	-	-
Identified Schemes Not Yet approved
HRA Capital Investment Programme 2025-26	65.823	-	-	-	-
HRA Capital Investment Programme 2026-27	-	169.075	-	-	-
HRA Capital Investment Programme 2027-28	-	-	88.287	-	-
HRA Capital Investment Programme 2028-29	-	-	-	56.749	-
HRA Capital Investment Programme 2029-30	-	-	-	-	54.731
Total Homes & Adult Social Care - HRA	111.098	169.075	88.287	56.749	54.731

City Operations

Supporting a Better Brighton & Hove for All

City Operations’ focus is on making the city a vibrant place where people want to live, visit and do business, and where the unique character of Brighton and Hove is celebrated and enhanced. This includes making the city an accessible and sustainable place where people are well-connected and can enjoy an attractive, well-maintained built and natural environment.

The focus during 2025/26 is driving the city’s progress towards achieving net zero carbon by 2030 and working with partners to create the right conditions for a prosperous Brighton and Hove by supporting investment. Our focus will be on providing reliable, well-run services to the public, as well as protecting and regenerating key assets, and generating key sources of income for the authority. We will support the ambitions of the directorate to preserve the city’s resources for future generations and promote pride in place. This is achieved through delivering the services detailed below.

About the Services

Place

Place leads on place-making and many of the council’s built environment functions. The service shapes development in the city through the statutory plan making process, development management and building control to ensure good urban design and protection of heritage, as well as compliance with building regulations to ensure safety. Driving the city’s progress towards net zero , the focus is on delivery of high impact projects to address the effects of climate change and sustainable development.

The Place directorate also shapes the city through its major regeneration programme and investment in major projects, including development of new affordable homes through the Homes for Brighton & Hove joint venture and New Homes for Neighbourhoods Programme. The team includes the council’s in-house Architecture and Design service and has a focus on creating better buildings and public spaces which are more climate resilient.

City Infrastructure - Transport

City Infrastructure develops clear plans to address the city’s current and future transport needs, working closely with Transport for The South East (TfSE) and other transport partners to deliver major highway infrastructure projects on key travel routes, such as Valley Gardens. A key priority is to maintain and improve the city’s transport network to transform user experience, increase resilience and extend the life of key highway assets, including managing the risks posed by flooding and protecting coastal highway structures. The service also ensures the city keeps moving through regulating road use, managing on-street and off-street parking and ensuring that all works are coordinated on the highway. Influencing people’s travel choices to reduce congestion and support improvements in air quality is also an important focus, providing sustainable transport options including enhancements in public transport, walking and cycling schemes, concessionary travel and an electric vehicle charging network.

City Infrastructure - Regulatory Services

Regulatory Services provides a broad range of services including Food Safety, Environmental Protection, Health & Safety, Licensing, Trading Standards and Animal Licensing.

The budget is linked to statutory functions to provide a wide range of Environmental health and regulatory services which protect public health.

Some areas of regulatory services, such as Food Safety continue to address the backlog of work arising from the pandemic and the focus is on more innovative and efficient methods of working whilst both catching up on the work delayed and continuing to provide the full range of statutory functions as required by the council.

Environmental Services

Environmental Services delivers recycling, refuse and street cleansing services to improve the cleanliness of the city and meet the council’s environmental obligations. This includes traded commercial, bulky and garden waste services to residents and businesses across the city. Through delivery of the Fleet Strategy the service is leading the decarbonisation of council vehicles and ensures they are well maintained and legally compliant.

Culture & Environment

& Environment manages the city’s visitor economy assets including the Brighton Centre, parks and the seafront to ensure the city remains a leading national and international visitor destination. It oversees an annual programme of varied and inclusive major outdoor events and community events to promote the city, and manages major contracts with key culture providers, including the Royal Pavilion Museums Trust and Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival, to ensure they have a diverse reach and contribute to the city’s economic ambitions.

The service also leads the delivery of the council’s ten-year plan for revitalising sports facilities and manages contracts with the RNLI for the seasonal beach lifeguards service, leisure contract, and investments in key leisure assets, including the new Hove Beach Park. Supporting artists and creative business in the city to flourish is a key role of the service, leading on research and strategic growth initiatives , making the case for culture at risk, securing investment for public art initiatives, making the case for investment in culture, heritage and the creative industries and facilitating inclusive communication.

The service is responsible for managing and conserving every park and green open spaces. We have mapped all our rights of way to ensure we can manage our assets effectively. We plan to roll this out to all our green spaces as well as to develop a creative approach to rights of way through our urban environment, flagging more green arteries. Our work includes the delivery of the Open Spaces Strategy, Stanmer Park Masterplan, management of the city’s allotments/cemeteries, and managing and protecting tree stocks.

The service leads the delivery of the council’s 10-year strategic plan for revitalising and investing in sports facilities, including sports centres, playgrounds, outdoor gyms, pavilions and pitches. It manages major contracts with the RNLI , Freedom Leisure, and investments in key leisure assets such as Hove Beach Park.

IT & Digital (a partnership service)

The IT & Digital (IT&D) service is an in-house function working in partnership with East Sussex County Council and Surrey County Council. The partnership provides economies of scope and scale and a shared leadership structure for the IT and Digital service. The service seeks to enable the council to deliver its operational and strategic priorities through technology, information, and collective expertise. IT & Digital helps people to connect, collaborate and work efficiently from wherever they need to be to get the job done. The end-to-end IT services cover Information to Infrastructure and everything in between. Enabling innovation through digital and data projects and ensuring the technology infrastructure foundations and compliance regimes are in place.

Supporting the Council’s Priorities

Below is a summary of work we have planned over the next four years that supports the priorities set out in the Council Plan.

A City to be Proud of

• Develop Brighton & Hove as a place where people want to live, work, and learn.

• Grow a diverse and sustainable city economy.

• Promote and protect what makes Brighton & Hove unique.

• Keep our city clean and manage waste including introduction of a new food waste collection service.

• Work towards carbon net zero.

• Protect and enhance the city’s natural environment.

• Make it easier for people to move around the city through network management, our Bus Partnership and other initiatives such as Park & Ride.

A Fair and Inclusive City

• Create safe public spaces that are accessible for all.

• Support Homes for everyone by increasing supply through Homes for Neighbourhoods, Joint Venture programmes and other regeneration programmes.

A Healthy City where people Thrive

• Support the provision of high quality and inclusive education from early years through to adult learning.

A Responsive Council with Well-Run Services

• Enable the successful delivery of digital improvement projects and programmes through the co-design and co-delivery of underpinning technologies, platforms and services in IT&D to support services in delivering corporate priorities.

• Develop a scalable and resilient IT&D technical architecture which provides a secure, highly available platform for business services.

• Good governance and financial resilience.

Medium Term Budget Strategy

City Operations fulfils a specific place making role for Brighton and Hove, leading the city towards achieving net zero carbon, building people’s pride in place and supporting the growth of a diverse and resilient economy. Key directorate objectives for 2025/26 include:

• Investing in a programme of high impact projects that will increase the city’s resilience to, and address, climate change.

• Working across the council and the city to support the transition to a circular and more equitable economy.

• Delivering key improvements to the council’s sports facilities in line with the Sports Facilities and Investment Plan.

• Developing a new sustainable local Transport Plan for the city.

• Implementing progressive service changes as part of the City Environmental Improvement Programme including a new Food Waste Collection service and wider Collections Review.

• Embedding a new Economic Growth Strategy for the city.

• Progressing the city’s major regeneration and infrastructure projects.

• Working with Homes and Adult Social Care to deliver new council homes and affordable homes through the New Homes for Neighbourhood Programme and Homes for Brighton & Hove joint venture.

To ensure the directorate can achieve its objectives the budget strategy focuses on reducing costs, maximising income and exploring alternative service delivery models, in particular:

• Delivering core services effectively and efficiently, pursuing all opportunities for collaboration, innovation and streamlining through improved use of technology, or bringing together areas of work, skills and expertise.

• Investing in services to modernise them for the future and ensuring we continue delivering the best for our customers whilst reducing running costs and lowering our carbon footprint, for example, through continued electrification of our fleet.

• Adopting a more entrepreneurial approach to secure new sources of partnership funding and maximise existing income streams.

• Making the best use of council assets, including leasing plus disposing of premises where this is a viable option.

• Reviewing standards of service and exploring new partnerships or contractual arrangements to support service delivery, as well as opportunities to have community-led services.

• Supporting staff and their professional development to ensure the directorate has a diverse, resilient workforce and one with the relevant skills, knowledge and expertise to deliver its core objectives.

Transforming Services

City Operations has reviewed all the services it delivers identifying opportunities to transform the service through savings and efficiencies. These will be achieved through a mixture of commercial approaches to generating income, service redesigns and efficiencies, and changes in contractual arrangements.

Redesigning and increasing efficiencies in key business areas, including City Clean, Culture and Environment, parking, planning and sustainability. This involves reorganising staffing structures to streamline decision making. Further savings from the removal of vacant posts across Transport, City Parks, and Place Services will enable these service areas to continue operating within a reduced budget, whilst meeting council priorities.

Taking a more entrepreneurial approach to leisure and tourism facilities and the sale of event and commercial activity space in the city will increase revenues. Coupled with a review of the council’s agreements with its cultural partners and options to generate income from cultural consultancy in the planning process, income will be bolstered.

Savings will also be made from ending services that are no longer delivering a sufficient return and looking at opportunities to transfer assets out of the council to partners or communities.

Digital Innovation will continue to review the services delivered ensuring contracts are reviewed and reprocured, ensuring best value is achieved and ensuring best working practices are implemented across the council’s networks.

There are limited opportunities for Regulatory Services to make savings; proposed budgets for 2025/26 will ensure services continue following a redesign for the services provided.

As a result of decommitted and delayed spend on capital projects the council’s capital programme will diminish, and budget savings on consultancy and professional fees will follow.

Investment in Services

A wide range of capital and revenue investments are planned across City Operations to support the achievement of priorities and help to deliver transformation and savings programmes as follows:

• Investment of over £2 million capital funding and £1.2 million net revenue funding to introduce a new Food Waste collection service for the city.

• Long term capital investment to renew and strengthen the infrastructure of the city will continue, to ensure effective management of the highway network and improve air quality, along with the delivery of major regeneration projects to bring about quality new affordable housing and business space whilst generating income from land and property assets and increasing business rate and council tax returns.

• Working with Homes & Adult Social Care to provide continued investment in the development of new Council housing through the New Homes for Neighbourhood Programme and new living wage rent housing through the Homes for Brighton & Hove joint venture.

• Delivering major regeneration programmes to generate further revenues each year in new council tax and business rates.

• Investment in Seafront Infrastructure, including £12m investment in the eastern seafront at Black Rock and progressing the restoration of Madeira Terraces.

• Implementation of the new 10-year Sports Facilities Investment Plan, including progressing the delivery of a new Leisure Centre to replace the King Alfred.

• Delivery of £1.76m Shared Prosperity Funding to eligible local businesses or communities to improve pride in place and level up people's life chances. For 2025/26 SPF funds will support core programmes and City Operations staffing.

• Implementation of the City Downland Estate Plan with over 60 actions prioritised into a short, medium, and long-term programme of projects, using natural capital and generating income.

• Continued investment in the city’s cultural assets including a new creative workspace plan in development to provide workspace for the creative industries in the city and to deliver an income to the council.

• Delivery of the Royal Pavilion Estate Masterplan and £35m capital investment programme.

• Delivery of the Local Transport Plan capital programme to provide integrated transport projects and a maintenance programme of carriage and footway resurfacing works on the transport network.

• Continued investment in the city’s electric vehicle charging network utilising government grant funding.

• Continued investment in the Brighton Marina to River Adur coastal protection scheme in partnership with other Authorities and with significant investment from the Environment Agency.

• Investment in the city’s playgrounds, parks and open spaces including the Stanmer Park Master Plan restoration project.

• Investment in the Fleet Strategy to progress the decarbonisation of the council’s fleet.

• Investment in the city’s tree collection to tackle the impacts of elm disease and ash dieback.

• £3m capital investment in the city’s public toilets.

• Continued investment in City Environment infrastructure and operational sites to improve the working environment and impact on the service’s carbon footprint.

• Investment in business systems to improve service performance and customer experience.

Service Metrics

Place

· One of the top twenty busiest unitary authority Planning services in England, dealing with 3000+ applications and 600+ enforcement case each year

· 15 projects and 269 new council homes via New Homes for Neighbourhoods, with planning approval for 264 more homes and a further 100 homes in the pipeline.

· Started on site to deliver the Phase 1 restoration of Madeira Terraces as an outdoor visitor destination, including 28 of the historic arches.

· Managing the UK’s only urban UNESCO Biosphere Region covering 390km2 on behalf of the Living Coast Partnership.

· Engaging over 700 stakeholders in developing a new City Plan to cover the period up to 2041.

· Enabled the building of 1075 new homes in the city in 2023/24 - the highest level of housebuilding in over 20 years.

City Infrastructure

Transport

· Managing highway infrastructure worth £4bn, including 624km of carriageway, 38km of cycle lanes and 1,200km of footways.

· Delivering a £28m Bus Service Improvement Programme.  

· Issuing and enforcing approximately 4,000 skips, scaffold and tables & chairs licences on the highway.

· Monitoring air quality in 6 areas across the city where levels of nitrogen dioxide are too high.

· 450+ on-street electric vehicle charging points installed and 3 rapid charging hubs across the city.

· Monitoring 240+ CCTV cameras to manage traffic throughout the city which issue 100,000 PCN’s each year.

· £10m+ invested in concessionary travel each year and 10,000+ concessionary bus passes issued.

· Managing 37,000+ resident parking permit accounts and 44,000+ on and off-street car park spaces.

· Managing 6 multi storey and 4 surface off-street car parks with 2,500 spaces, 1m transactions per annum brining in £10m income.

Regulatory Services

· Over 83% of the 3,200 food businesses in the city rated 3 or above on the national Food Hygiene Rating Scheme;

· 1,400 premises licensed venues and 278 gambling premises licensed in the city. 1200 licensed taxi drivers. 580 Hackney Carriage and 370 private hire vehicles licensed;

· Over 3000 noise complaints including both domestic and commercial requiring investigation in 2023;

· Obtained £104,000 worth of refunds and compensation for vulnerable consumers in 2023.

Environmental Services

· Carrying out 5 million refuse collections and 2.5 million recycling collections each year.

· Providing power to fuel 25,000 homes a year by recovering energy from waste that cannot be recycled.

· Management and maintenance of 500+ council vehicles, including 66 electric vehicles.

· Maintaining and cleaning 700 miles of pavement.

· Maintaining 34 public toilet sites and delivering a £4.5m refurbishment programme.

· Issuing around 4,000 fixed penalty notices each year for environmental offences.

Culture & Environment

· Sports facilities with over 1.5 million attendances in the city each year.

· Co-ordinating approx. 200 outdoor events and 400 filming activities each year, with over 0.5m participants.

· Approx. 70,000 resident visits equating to 24% of the city’s population and 18,000 school aged children engaging in formal learning across the Royal Pavilion and Museums.

· Sharing resources and information with more than 1,600 creative businesses and artists in the city, and funding local creatives through grant schemes such as Exhale, as part of Brighton & Hove’s commitment to being an anti-racist city.

· 13 km of seafront, working 365 days a year with 200 properties under management.

· Brighton Centre delivering £50-£60m of economic impact for the city per annum and sells 250,000 tickets each year.

· Managing 147 parks and gardens, 74 outdoor spaces, 8 cemeteries and more than 3,000 allotments.

· Maintains 53 playgrounds and continuing a refurbishment programme through capital investment.

· Managing more than 12,000 street trees and over 500 hectares of woodland.

IT and Digital

· Maintains and supports the mission critical underpinning IT infrastructure used to run back-office services and deliver services to residents. This includes the management and procurement of devices (e.g., laptops), software (e.g., Microsoft O365), network connectivity, telephony (mobile, contact centre and office), data centre and data storage services, Always on VPN (AOVPN remote access) and other contracts.

· Supports the day-to-day provision use of hardware, software and IT applications.

· Provides cyber resilience through the procurement and use of cyber monitoring and filtering technologies, as well, as the provision of secure remote connection that enables remote access to council systems and data.

· Provides traded IT support and training services to schools in the City of Brighton and Hove.

· Delivers projects and programmes to support the adoption of new IT and digital capabilities to enable service improvement and improved resident experience.

· Delivers the DDaT strategy under the council’s ‘well run Council’ objective which aims to improve resident’s access to services, reduce failure demand and improve our reputation through the provision of easy-to-use online services. The associated programmes also establish the foundational approaches to support better management and exploitation of data assets through new technologies, such as AI.

· Support the council’s adherence to IT and data regulation and compliance standards including GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) and PSN (Public Service Network) code of connection services.

City Operations Budget Summary
2024/25 Net Expenditure / (Income)		2025/26 Budget					2025/26 Budgeted Contracted Staff
2024/25 Net Expenditure / (Income)	Service Area	Expenditure	Income	Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)	2025/26 Budgeted Contracted Staff
£m		£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	FTE
10.070	City Infrastructure	49.083	(52.176)	(3.093)	15.876	12.783	303.1
21.823	Environment & Culture	18.376	(11.185)	7.191	12.838	20.029	235.5
38.694	Environmental Services	43.153	(10.567)	32.586	4.630	37.216	391.6
3.599	Place	5.215	(2.238)	2.977	1.259	4.236	86.1
(0.533)	Digital Innovation	9.022	(0.169)	8.853	(9.738)	(0.885)	122.7
73.654	City Operations Total	124.849	(76.335)	48.514	24.864	73.378	1,138.9

City Operations 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown
Service Description	Employee Expenditure	Other Expenditure	Total Expenditure	Income From Fees, Charges & Rents	Other Income	Government Grants	Total Income	Total Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)
Service Description	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
City Infrastructure
Animal Welfare	0.145	0.070	0.214	(0.007)	-	-	(0.007)	0.207	0.022	0.228
Civil Contingencies	0.161	(0.005)	0.156	-	-	-	-	0.156	0.020	0.176
Concessionary Bus Fares	-	10.854	10.854	(0.021)	-	-	(0.021)	10.833	0.061	10.894
Environmental Health	1.040	(0.004)	1.037	(0.011)	-	-	(0.011)	1.026	0.134	1.160
Highway & Traffic Management	0.790	1.172	1.962	(1.030)	-	-	(1.030)	0.932	0.914	1.846
Highway Assets & Maintenance	1.346	2.829	4.175	(0.014)	-	-	(0.014)	4.161	4.208	8.369
Licensing	0.716	0.048	0.764	(0.958)	-	-	(0.958)	(0.194)	0.238	0.044
Parking Operations	7.175	13.658	20.833	(47.657)	-	(0.194)	(47.851)	(27.018)	2.977	(24.041)
Public Transport	0.481	1.486	1.968	(0.519)	(0.016)	(0.370)	(0.905)	1.062	0.168	1.230
Road Safety	0.760	(0.027)	0.732	(0.024)	-	(0.060)	(0.084)	0.648	0.601	1.249
Road Works Permit Scheme	0.676	0.084	0.760	(0.831)	-	-	(0.831)	(0.071)	0.117	0.046
Schools Skills & Learning	0.304	(0.248)	0.056	(0.060)	-	-	(0.060)	(0.004)	0.074	0.070
Street Lighting & Illuminations	0.111	2.656	2.767	(0.038)	-	-	(0.038)	2.729	0.767	3.495
Trading Standards	0.327	0.030	0.357	(0.003)	-	-	(0.003)	0.354	0.055	0.408
Transport Projects	0.316	0.481	0.797	-	-	-	-	0.797	5.838	6.634
Winter Maintenance	(0.113)	0.261	0.149	-	-	-	-	0.149	0.017	0.166
Head of Transport, Policy and Strategy	1.210	0.294	1.504	(0.363)	-	-	(0.363)	1.141	(0.333)	0.808
City Infrastructure Total	15.446	33.638	49.083	(51.536)	(0.016)	(0.624)	(52.176)	(3.093)	15.876	12.783
Environment & Culture
Bereavement Services	0.671	0.864	1.535	(2.056)	(0.037)	-	(2.094)	(0.559)	0.692	0.134
City Parks	5.781	1.062	6.843	(0.796)	(0.141)	(0.060)	(0.997)	5.846	2.778	8.625
Royal Pavilion & Museums	-	1.540	1.540	-	-	-	-	1.540	3.149	4.688
Seafront Services	0.884	0.096	0.980	(3.116)	-	-	(3.116)	(2.136)	1.668	(0.468)
Sports Facilities	0.168	1.162	1.330	(0.177)	-	-	(0.177)	1.153	1.846	2.999
Venues	2.836	0.103	2.939	(3.619)	-	-	(3.619)	(0.680)	1.885	1.206
Volks Railway	0.383	0.072	0.456	(0.385)	-	-	(0.385)	0.070	0.278	0.349
Arts (including Partnership Arrangements)	0.352	2.098	2.449	(0.144)	-	-	(0.144)	2.305	0.355	2.660
Outdoor Events	0.144	0.160	0.304	(0.653)	-	-	(0.653)	(0.349)	0.186	(0.163)
Environment & Culture Total	11.219	7.157	18.376	(10.947)	(0.178)	(0.060)	(11.185)	7.191	12.838	20.029
Environmental Services
City Clean - Refuse & Recycling	10.525	0.663	11.188	(1.931)	(2.918)	-	(4.849)	6.339	1.058	7.397
City Clean - Street Cleansing	7.352	0.963	8.315	(0.002)	-	-	(0.002)	8.312	0.622	8.934
Public Conveniences	0.936	0.601	1.537	-	-	-	-	1.537	0.742	2.279
Vehicle Fleet & Maintenance	1.027	2.784	3.811	(0.167)	-	-	(0.167)	3.644	1.055	4.699
Head of City Environmental Management	0.064	0.020	0.084	-	-	-	-	0.084	(0.058)	0.026
Strategy & Projects	1.605	0.259	1.865	(0.676)	-	-	(0.676)	1.189	(0.106)	1.082
Waste Disposal	-	16.354	16.354	(0.818)	(2.504)	(1.550)	(4.873)	11.481	1.317	12.799
Environmental Services Total	21.510	21.644	43.153	(3.594)	(5.422)	(1.550)	(10.567)	32.586	4.630	37.216
Place
Architecture & Design	(0.550)	0.299	(0.251)	-	-	-	-	(0.251)	0.122	(0.129)
Building Control	0.895	0.010	0.906	(1.038)	-	-	(1.038)	(0.133)	0.111	(0.021)
Business Development & Customer Services	0.631	0.016	0.646	(0.011)	-	-	(0.011)	0.635	0.145	0.781
Development Planning	1.546	0.093	1.639	(1.103)	-	-	(1.103)	0.536	0.314	0.850
Economic Development	0.103	-	0.103	-	-	-	-	0.103	(0.101)	0.002
Economy, Environment & Culture Management	0.198	0.007	0.206	-	-	-	-	0.206	(0.206)	-
Energy & Water Management	0.207	(0.028)	0.179	-	-	-	-	0.179	(0.175)	0.004
Head Of Planning	0.220	0.037	0.257	-	-	-	-	0.257	(0.257)	-
Major Projects & Regeneration	0.229	0.009	0.238	-	(0.051)	-	(0.051)	0.187	1.065	1.252
Sustainability	0.387	0.139	0.527	(0.022)	-	-	(0.022)	0.505	0.081	0.586
Planning Policy, Projects and Heritage	0.578	0.187	0.765	(0.013)	-	-	(0.013)	0.753	0.159	0.912
Place Total	4.446	0.769	5.215	(2.187)	(0.051)	-	(2.238)	2.977	1.259	4.236
Digital Innovation
Information Technology & Digital	5.777	3.246	9.022	(0.102)	(0.067)	-	(0.169)	8.853	(9.738)	(0.885)
Digital Innovation Total	5.777	3.246	9.022	(0.102)	(0.067)	-	(0.169)	8.853	(9.738)	(0.885)
City Operations Total	58.397	66.453	124.849	(68.366)	(5.734)	(2.235)	(76.335)	48.514	24.864	73.378

City Operations Budget Plan
Section & Service Area	Summary of Budget Proposal/Strategy	Delivery Risk & Impact	Savings Proposals 2025/26
Section & Service Area	Summary of Budget Proposal/Strategy	Delivery Risk & Impact	£m
City Infrastructure
Network Management	Increase Highway licensing fees by 5% to cover the cost of providing the service.	Highway licensing fees can only cover the cost of administration of the licences but this increase is compliant.	0.016
Network Management	A redesign of the Highways Operations Team (£0.050m) to focus the activity on key programmes of works to protect and maintain the city’s highways infrastructure will result in efficiencies and the deletion of 1 FTE post.	Risk: The redesign would put staff at risk of redundancy	0.050
Parking Services	A re-focus of the transport control centre activity to monitor cross council services, including monitoring risk in HRA LPS and high-rise buildings which will be generated from charging the associated costs to the HRA.	The traffic monitoring will reduce as a result of the refocus, which may have an impact on response times for high profile events as well as impact on the general network, such as network blockages and over run of highways works. When works progress on the HRA high rise blocks, alternative funding will need to be sought as the focus on the HRA reduces.	0.293
Parking Services	The introduction of new light touch parking schemes across the city would generate additional income (£0.070m). These schemes are generally supported by the identified residential areas to address parking challenges.	Risk that income doesn't meet projections. This would be mitigated through increased priority of a programme of further areas to take forward.	0.070
Safer Communities - Regulatory Services	A redesign of the team to reduce the technical support provided to the Regulatory Services Team by 1fte due to reduced responsibilities following the previous removal of pest control and other functions of the service.	Reduced support for food/health & safety/environmental protection service, but since the removal of the Pest Control function and technical improvements, the impact would be manageable.	0.035
Safer Communities - Regulatory Services	Review animal welfare service model for stray dog collection and re-homing. This is likely to result in the reduction of 1 FTE post.	Animal licensing function is retained, but reduced staffing would mean less resilience in the team.	0.039
Safer Communities - Trading Standards	Cease providing the non-statutory function of providing civil fair trading advice to local businesses and consumers, resulting in a reduction in posts by 0.5fte	This will impact on businesses and consumers in reducing their financial loss.	0.027
Transport Projects and Engineering - Highway and Transport Development	A redesign of the Transport Development Team to realise efficiencies, which will be managed through deleting 1 FTE vacant post.	Minimal impacts. Work has been undertaken to more effectively plan and manage workloads and minimise disruption.	0.058
City Infrastructure Total			0.588
Environment and Culture
City Parks - Arboriculture	Directly sell the ash that is cut down in our woodlands for use by biomass power stations, rather than allowing contractors to take it as part payment for the work they are doing.	Limited to a 2 year programme. Risk of increased costs for felling works if resale is taken in-house. Finite revenue stream as ash removal due to Ash dieback is expected to drop in coming years, plus less immediate risk sites which are worked on latterly are often those with less extractable timber, therefore diminishing returns expected.	0.014
City Parks - Arboriculture	Sell elm timber for construction, landscaping or furniture manufacture, also reducing the amount of elm timber needing to be disposed of by burning as per the existing Elm Disease control program. This would require debarking or strict control of where the timber went to avoid the risk of elm disease spread.	Infection risk needs to be strictly managed for Elm timber, with strict compliance of (and enforcement of) merchants not to sell any elm back to the market as firewood.	0.011
City Parks - Events	Leasing sites within City Parks to mobile commercial operators (£0.060m) such as dog groomers and coffee shops.	Suitable sites to be identified.	0.060
City Parks - Operations	Generating income through developing a scheme for donations programmes to promote charitable giving to heritage infrastructure.	Saving is dependent on a new philanthropic role being recruited to on a minimum contract of 12 months. Post will look at setting up a range of philanthropic schemes, including parks, seafront and trees donations, to support reinvestment in the parks and seafront infrastructure. A prudent target assumed for 2025/26.	0.020
City Parks - Operations	Generate parking income at Vale Park and Victoria Park.	Dependent on demand and nearby on street parking charges. May be publicly unpopular. Modest target assumed.	0.005
City Parks - Operations	Identifying sponsorship for the annual Palmeira Square Christmas tree.	Potential loss of the Christmas tree if no sponsor is identified.	0.008
City Parks - Operations	Reduction of overtime within the service, implementing alternative working methods.	This would reduce lone working but the preparation of vehicles will need to be spread between operatives. Longer term savings are connected to delivering tasks differently and within working hours. Staff who have been working overtime regularly will see their income reduce.	0.024
Life Events - Bereavement Services	A 4.6% staffing vacancy factor will be applied across the service to reflect and manage turnover rates of staff.	Reduces available resources to manage demands and meet statutory duties but is based on prevailing turnover rates which are currently being managed.	0.018
Sport and Leisure - Events	Form a coordinated primary authority partnership and manage resources to reduce and/or recharge internal costs for managing the 'Purple Guide' for outdoor event organisers.	Minimal impact on existing staff capacity.	0.005
Sport and Leisure - Seafront Service	The seafront lifeguard service has been re-provisioned with a contract with a new provider due to be awarded from the summer season in 2025. A saving proposed over two years is related to the reprovision of this service, and a subsequent review of the wider seafront operational services.	Contract with a new provider signed in January 2025. A review of the wider structure to follow.	0.110
Sport and Leisure - Sports facilities	Generate income from new 3G pitches at Withdean Sports Complex.	This can be actioned and is a prudent estimate.	0.025
Sport and Leisure - Sports facilities	Pilot a self service laundry pod at Withdean Sports Complex (modelled on 50% share with Leisure contractor).	Pilot scheme, untested, hence a modest target. Contract required with laundry pod provider. BHCC would need to agree a % share of income with Leisure Contract provider.	0.003
Sport and Leisure - Sports facilities	The Kings Road paddling pool will need to be temporarily closed during summer 2025 as a result of highways works being undertaken on the nearby seafront arches. This will mitigate ongoing maintenance costs during 2025/26 (£0.060m). Plans for refurbishment of the site will be explored whilst the site is temporarily closed.	In 2025/26 the facility needs to close temporarily anyway. The facility is providing free access to water play, therefore ultimate closure is likely to be unpopular with residents and visitors, particularly families with young children. There would be decommissioning costs.	0.060
Tourism & Venues - Brighton Centre	Introduction of delegate day rates for The Wing at the Brighton Centre, generating a new income stream.	Market dependent but prudent target set to mitigate risks.	0.025
Environment and Culture Total			0.388
Environmental Services
City Clean - Commercial Waste	Increase the provision of trade waste services and extend garden waste collections to respond to the high demand for these services across the city. Fees will also be increased to reflect the cost of providing the service	Demand for the service is high across the city. The introduction of Simpler Recycling may impact on the council’s ability to deliver a competitive recycling offer.	0.268
City Clean - City Clean	The demand for customer services has reduced, therefore the service can be remodelled to reflect reduced demand for customer support, resulting in a reduction of the team of 1 FTE.	Minimal risk anticipated, will be managed through vacancy management.	0.035
Environmental Services Total			0.303
Place
Architecture & Design	Reduce Architecture and Design expenditure on professional consultants’ fees. The need for consultancy will reduce as the council's capital programme reduces different construction procurement routes are explored and used.	Risk: this may impact on delivery timescales and reduce the availability of expertise. However, consultants can be procured for specific projects where required to mitigate this.	0.215
Development Planning - Building Control	Cease the dangerous structures rota. No visits to dangerous structures out of hours as new Building Control competencies mean we are not able to give advice on structural integrity. Instead fence off the Highway and make safe.	May be a negative public perception as the approach will be to triage, fence and leave, rather than demolish.	0.010
Development Planning - Building Control	General revenue from charging for demolition notices, which is in line with other, similar, local authorities	Minimal impact expected and a prudent target set.	0.006
Net Zero	Capitalisation of project resources for climate change projects as and when projects are agreed.	The strategy depends upon the availability of projects to capitalise resources against. Therefore 1 FTE post will remain vacant until the project pipeline is confirmed to ensure the saving is met	0.065
Planning Policy and Projects	Redesign the Planning Policy Team following the recent wider organisational redesign, which is likely to lead to a reduction of 1.6 FTE.	Risk: reducing the team’s capacity may impact on the timescales of delivery for the local plan and planning guidance	0.094
Regen and Major Projects	Reduce Regeneration team initiatives budget.	A modest saving with minimal impact expected.	0.003
Place Total			0.393
Digital Innovation
Enterprise Tech - Wide Area Network	The migration to the MLL Wide Area network will have lower operating costs following completion at the end of 2024/25.	Risk: Enhancements to speeds or functionality may erode the efficiency. Though unlikely within the medium term. Impact: None identified.	0.030
User Experience - Managed Print	A review of multi-functional devices and changing the model of delivery, allowing the reduction in number of devices and a reduction in printer volumes to be built into the re-procurement of the contract.	Increasing office occupancy drives up printer use, and people don’t change behaviours.	0.080
Digital Innovation Total			0.110
City Operations Total			1.782

City Operations Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30
	Profiled Payments 2025/26	Profiled Payments 2026/27	Profiled Payments 2027/28	Profiled Payments 2028/29	Profiled Payments 2029/30
	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Approved Schemes
Redevelopment of King Alfred Swimming Pool	0.052	-	-	-	-
Madeira Terraces Regeneration - Project Support	9.650	0.492	-	-	-
Madeira Terraces Crowd Funding Contribution	0.460	-	-	-	-
Madeira Terraces Bequest Funding	-	0.030	-	-	-
King Alfred Leisure Centre Regeneration Project	2.423	-	-	-	-
Public Conveniences	0.905	-	-	-	-
On-Street and Communal Bin Infrastructure	0.500	0.250	0.250	-	-
Hollingdean Depot Office Accommodation	2.188	-	-	-	-
CNF - Improving WEEE recycling	0.009	-	-	-	-
CNF - Improving the Communal Bin System	0.588	-	-	-	-
Weekly Food Waste Collections Capital Grant	2.444	-	-	-	-
Procurement of Vehicles	2.500	2.500	2.500	2.500	2.500
Integrated Transport Schemes (LTP)	0.300	-	-	-	-
Bridge Strengthening and Assessment	0.781	0.781	-	-	-
Street Lighting Maintenance (LTP)	0.900	-	-	-	-
Major Projects (LTP)	0.039	-	-	-	-
Valley Gardens Phase 3 (LTP)	7.544	2.557	-	-	-
Hove Station Footbridge	0.500	-	-	-	-
Covered Cycle Racks	0.055	-	-	-	-
Safer Streets Fund Streetlighting	0.018	-	-	-	-
Seafront Heritage Lighting Renewal Programme	0.591	-	-	-	-
Active Emergency Travel Fund - Tranche 3	1.000	-	-	-	-
Bus Service Improvement Scheme	3.220	-	-	-	-
CNF - Determining Emission Category Citywide Vehicle Fleet	0.030	0.030	-	-	-
Active Emergency Travel Fund - Tranche 4	3.064	-	-	-	-
Safer Road Fund Round 3 - A2010 Brighton	0.300	-	-	-	-
Elm Grove / Queens Park Road	0.400	-	-	-	-
Zebra 2 - Zero Emissions Buses	3.448	-	-	-	-
Traffic Signal Obsolescence Grant	0.059	-	-	-	-
CCTV Expansion & Upgrade	0.150	0.150	0.150	-	-
Middle Street SuDs in Schools	0.330	-	-	-	-
Downland Initiative Programme	0.010	-	-	-	-
Pavilion and Mess Room Refurbishment Programme	0.110	0.109	0.950	1.400	-
Stanmer Pond Restoration & Access Improvement	-	0.076	-	-	-
Parks and Open Spaces Investment	1.050	0.650	1.420	-	-
CNF - Electrical Infrastructure at City Parks Fleet	0.092	-	-	-	-
Brighton Museum & Art Gallery Works	1.023	-	-	-	-
Royal Pavilion Estate Development (Phase 2 Gardens)	1.255	3.700	0.500	0.183	-
Seafront Railings Upgrade	0.170	-	-	-	-
Prince Regent Capital Works	0.600	-	-	-	-
Withdean Sports Complex Swimming Pool	0.100	-	-	-	-
Moulsecoomb Community Leisure Centre 3G Pitch	0.750	-	-	-	-
Stanley Deason Leisure Centre – All Weather Pitch	0.450	-	-	-	-
Brighton Centre Essential Maintenance	1.000	1.000	-	-	-
IT&D FIT Programme	0.400	0.100	-	-	-
IT Equipment for Members	0.040	0.040	0.040	0.040	0.040
Laptop Refresh 2023-25	1.000	0.250	-	-	-
IT&D Data Program	0.100	-	-	-	-
IT&D Projects	0.400	0.250	-	-	-
Customer Digital	2.330	1.380	1.000	1.000	-
Identified Schemes Not Yet approved
New England House - City Deal	9.618	-	-	-	-
Strategic Investment Fund	0.250	0.250	0.250	0.250	0.250
Local Transport Plan - Capital Grant	4.500	4.500	4.500	4.500	4.500
Pothole Action Fund - Capital Grant	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500
Incentive Funding - Highways Capital Grant	0.300	0.300	0.300	0.300	0.300
Enhanced LTP grant	1.300	-	-	-	-
Marina to River Adur Coast Protection Works	10.400	8.000	-	-	-
A27 Junction Improvements	3.515	2.800	3.374	5.937	-
Royal Pavilion Estate Development (Phase 3 Museum)	-	4.000	-	-	-
Withdean Sports Complex Swimming Pool (Unapproved)	2.349	3.000	-	-	-
Local Area Network Hardware Refresh	0.450	-	-	-	-
IT&D Data Programme	0.260	0.260	-	-	-
IT&D Fund	-	-	1.000	1.000	1.000
Total City Operations	88.770	37.955	16.734	17.610	9.090

Corporate Support Functions

Supporting a Better Brighton & Hove for All

The majority of the council’s Support Service Functions (except IT&D) are headed up by the three corporate roles of the Director of People & Innovation and two statutory directors, the Director of Governance & Law (and Monitoring Officer) and Director of Property & Finance (and S151 Chief Financial Officer). However, some support services are managed in a partnership with East Sussex and Surrey Council Councils including Internal Audit & Counter Fraud and Procurement. A number of front-line services are also managed within these directorships including Electoral Services, Local Land Charges, Welfare Support, Housing Benefit administration, and local tax collection and administration.

The aim of all support service functions is to provide trusted, efficient and expert support to the council to enable it to be a responsive and well-run council. This includes providing good quality customer services both internally and externally, and providing the strategic planning, operational support, and management information and insight to drive innovation and change in support of delivering planned transformation and savings programmes. Another key role is to ensure that the council maintains strong governance and internal controls to manage public resources effectively and to take safe, legally compliant decisions and actions.

Support Service functions therefore operate as a ‘Strategic Business Partner’ to the organisation and its service directorates and support them through complex changes by being involved in the development of options and their evaluation, through to decision-making and supporting implementation.

About the Services

The primary services provided by Corporate Support Functions include:

Cabinet Office

• Plays a key role in developing, guiding and internally promoting key strategies and acts as a liaison between the Administration and officers to drive policy development and develop strategic partnerships across the city.

Property, Finance and Internal Audit & Counter Fraud

• Provides strategic planning and management of the council’s commercial and operational estates.

• Finance, including the statutory Section 151 Chief Financial Officer role, overseeing the delivery of the council’s annual and medium term financial planning processes as well as a wide range of financial advisory and statutory services.

• Internal Audit & Counter Fraud (a partnership service) provides wide ranging reviews of services and systems to ensure effective internal controls and governance are in place and that fraud risks are minimised.

People & Innovation including Communications & Public Relations

• Human Resources and Organisational Development provide advisory, policy development and learning support services to the organisation.

• This area also includes Health & Safety advice and support for all council services and schools together with building maintenance and facilities management for all Corporate Landlord operational buildings.

• The Communications and Engagement service provides a public and internal service that communicates information and other content about the council, it’s decisions, policies, priorities and services.

• This area also provides a Programme Management Office to support innovation and improvement and delivery of planned transformation and savings proposals. Customer service improvement including the management of complaints and compliments is also a responsibility of this support service function.

IT & Digital (a Partnership Service)

• See City Operations.

Legal, Democratic and Electoral Services

• Provides legal advice and representation across all of the council’s functions as well as the statutory Monitoring Officer function.

• Provision of a legally compliant, democratic decision-making process including the co-ordination of support to Members and all Council Meetings including training & development and provision of support for the council’s Scrutiny function.

• Electoral Services provide end-to-end management of local elections with a primary aim of delivering safe and compliant elections.

Procurement (a Partnership service)

• Supports the development of procurement strategy and policies including sustainability, Environmental, Social & Governance strategy, social value and modern slavery.

• Supports procurement of goods and services to the value of approximately £300m per annum and manages and authorises waivers of Contract Standing Orders.

Welfare, Revenues & Business Support (WRBS)

• Provision of strategic support and policy development for responding to welfare reforms, as well as direct delivery of local welfare support, assistance and advice.

• Collection and recovery of Council Tax (and Council Tax Reduction Scheme), Business Rates, Sundry and Corporate Debts.

• Processing of Housing Benefit claims and managing the transfer to Universal Credit.

• Provision of Payroll Services to the council, schools and other contracted organisations and processing of payments to the council’s suppliers and providers (Accounts Payable).

• Provision of banking, purchasing card and urgent payment services.

• Support for the development and management of major corporate financial, HR and Payroll systems.

Many of the services above are also involved in providing a wide range of traded or contracted services to schools, South Downs National Park Authority, East Sussex Fire & Rescue, district councils and others which generates significant incomes.

Supporting the Council’s Priorities

Support Service Functions play a key role in facilitating other services to deliver against the Council Plan priorities, including the key aim of being a responsive council with well-run services at both a strategic and operational level. Helping the council to develop robust financial strategies, workforce plans, digital customer strategies, conduct effective communication, engagement and partnership working, develop robust and innovative policies, and respond effectively to welfare reforms is critical to maintaining sustainable, financially resilient and accessible council services.

A key determinant of the demands placed on Support Service Functions is therefore the level of change experienced across the organisation. This has been and remains at very high levels due to the cumulative effect of the growing financial challenges in local government requiring ever greater innovation in everything from digital services to corporate debt management to financing strategies that help resources and services go further. This creates a tension between the need to provide cost effective support functions while ensuring that the council and its services have the support to make sound business judgements and decisions that minimise legal, financial, employment, equality, health & safety, governance, internal control and other risks.

Support Service Functions underpin the authority’s governance framework, ensuring safe and legally compliant decision-making, as well as maintaining reviewing and improving the council’s internal control environment. Advisory and Business Partnering services within Finance, HR, IT&D and Procurement help the organisation to maximise its use of resources, fully evaluate options, avoid costly fines, mistakes or non-compliance occurrences, and thereby deliver cashable and non-cashable savings or cost-avoidance. Similarly, Programme Management and other resources ensure effective oversight and delivery of major improvement and innovation programmes funded by the Transformation Fund or Capital Investment.

These services are integral to front line delivery and work best when operating as a trusted Strategic Business Partner as part of both corporate and directorate leadership teams’ roles in developing strategic responses and solutions for delivery. They also ensure collaborative ‘one council’ working across the council by being able to share or link information to ensure a holistic approach to policy or service development. Over the medium term Support Service Functions aim to support council priorities through:

A City to be Proud of

• Supporting the development of underpinning policies, plans and strategies, such as Devolution, Economic Strategy, and Poverty Reduction.

• Providing a key place-shaping role through effective communication campaigns and channels including priority areas such as waste minimisation, promoting sustainability, publicising and consulting on regeneration and major developments, promoting cultural events and city travel.

• Providing support and oversight for the development of capital investment strategies and the use of capital receipt flexibilities to improve council services and invest in core infrastructure for the city.

A Fair and Inclusive City

• Continuing to develop a new approach to community engagement, including our approach to digital engagement and consultation – enabling a more agile approach to listening and responding.

• Reinvigorating collaborative working across the city to support co-operation across city partnerships and drive positive change.

• Supporting the Poverty Reduction Steering Group to develop a more sustainable, preventative, and holistic welfare response.

• Oversight of the council’s Fair and Inclusive Action Plan (FIAP) which supports the organisation to become reflective of the community, and to improve the experience and diversity of all staff, including embedding the council’s Anti-Racism Strategy and approach in all council policies.

• Embed policies and practice concerning Social Value, Community Wealth Building, Sustainability and Modern Slavery across all contracts.

A Healthy City where people Thrive

• Supporting the development of the Employment and Skills Plan.

• Providing key financial advice and support to enable School Organisation changes including implications for the DSG, General Fund and/or Capital Resources.

• Ensuring effective legal support and advice to support safeguarding and child protection including through decisions of the court.

• Providing communications plans which are an essential part of promoting health and wellbeing in the city and enabling behavioural change.

A Responsive Council with Well-Run Services

• Proactively listening and responding to resident concerns through increased use of digital channels of communication and engagement to ensure the council becomes a learning organisation able to continually improve services.

• Driving improvement and innovation by martialling project and programme management resources to support transformation and savings programmes.

• Enable the successful delivery of digital improvement projects and programmes through the co-design and co-delivery of underpinning technologies, platforms and services with IT&D to support services in delivering corporate priorities.

• Implementing the Corporate Systems Improvement (CSI) programme to modernise corporate HR, Finance, Payroll and Procurement systems to improve the integration of data, increase automation and efficiency including through the use of emerging AI technologies, and improve customer service.

• Developing a people strategy designed to ensure we are a learning organisation that has an engaged and motivated workforce who are able to deliver their best to the city and enable all priorities to be supported.

• Supporting the organisation to ensure it fulfils its legal and moral health & safety responsibilities to provide a safe working environment where staff are supported to be happy and well.

• Through procurement, ensuring that the city council's spending power is used to secure good value for money and, as far as possible with contract regulations and market conditions, to procure local services, and improve sustainability and social value.

Medium Term Budget Strategy

8The directorate’s budget strategy will continue to adopt the strategies below in an attempt to meet an increasing volume and complexity of demands efficiently and effectively. However, this is increasingly requiring effective demand management, which is generally managed through prioritisation and risk stratification.

Welfare, Revenues & Business Support has provided significant welfare support, advice and signposting, including through the Community Hub service which also supports the Homes for Ukrainians programme. However, much of the support is funded by one-off government grants and therefore the focus over the medium term will shift to developing collaborative and preventative strategies with other directorates and city partners rather than on granting emergency or hardship provision which does not ultimately provide long-term, sustainable solutions for low income households.

All services continue to explore further opportunities for collaboration, innovation and efficiency through improved use of technology, closer working with other directorates to design improved customer journeys and experience and exploring opportunities to bring services or skills together. In particular, the directorate will be key to supporting proposed ‘Organisational Redesign’ workstreams which will not only focus on management layers and spans, and the deployment of administrative roles, but will also examine common functional areas across the council to explore possible rationalisation or efficiencies, for example, commissioning and contracting functions or project and programme management roles.

Similarly, continued implementation of systems developments, automation and digital services will be undertaken to improve customer service and deliver potential efficiencies, primarily through the Corporate Systems Improvement programme.

Utilising and supporting external LGA peer challenge and reviews (at corporate and service level) to assist the authority in identifying strategic opportunities for improvement and financial sustainability.

Development and delivery of an updated and revised Corporate Debt Policy will provide for more effective pre-enforcement debt prevention, advice and signposting that minimises the financial and administrative costs of supporting financially vulnerable households across all council services while maintaining collection performance.

There will be a continued focus on maintaining and, where possible, increasing external income streams including renewal of contracts to existing customers including South Downs National Park and East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service alongside the pursuit of new income streams from other authorities. However, this must not be at the expense of service quality to the council and its residents and customers.

Recruiting new trainees, apprentices and internships to improve succession planning and mitigate the longer term cost and challenge of recruiting qualified professional staff which has become increasingly challenging over the last few years.

Transforming Services and Managing Demands

Supporting Devolution and Local Government Reorganisation: The government’s English Devolution White Paper will have far-reaching implications for provision of future local government services. The council has bid to join the priority programme and, whether admitted to this programme or not, all Support Service Functions will inevitably be required to support the planning process for change.

Welfare, Revenues & Business Support (WRBS): The continued roll-out of the Universal Credit caseload to the DWP and continued investment in digital customer developments and automation are required to support the achievement of efficiencies in this service which will accelerate over the next 4 years subject to no further delays to the Universal Credit transfer.

Corporate Systems Improvement Programme: This major programme aims to re-procure separate systems that are fit for purpose (‘best of breed’) but to use them (re-install them) in the way they were designed to be used (‘adopt not adapt’) rather than tailoring them for unnecessarily complex and superfluous local requirements. The data will be cleansed and new technologies and modules will be used to link data across the systems, automate as many processes as possible, improve the ease of use of the systems and make reporting and decision-making quicker.

Workspace Innovation Programme: This programme is an extension of the previous workstyles approach aimed at realigning the use of administrative buildings to support new ways of working, providing increased collaboration, flexible and remote working opportunities, delivering flexible and multi-purpose spaces, and installing modern technologies for meetings and data sharing. It will also aim to reduce the council’s occupancy of administrative buildings to reduce costs and carbon emissions.

A corporate disposal programme of operational and commercial assets will also support the budget strategy. Reviewing the council’s operational assets will continue to support changes in service delivery across the council, reducing spend on running costs, delivering potential capital receipts through the sale of vacant properties, and rationalising the council’s corporate offices. A review of commercial assets in conjunction with the One Public Estate agenda, working with other public sector organisations, will also release sites for regeneration or comprehensive redevelopment.

Investment in Services

Investment in Support Service Functions will be through a mix of revenue, capital and Transformation Fund resources as follows:

• Capital investment for Phase 1 of the Corporate Systems Improvement programme of £2.750m will be provided as approved by Cabinet in November 2024.

• There will be investment in project and programme management support, the Workspace Innovation Programme, and additional HR and Leadership Development support to drive innovation and change. This will require minimum investment from the Transformation Fund of £1 million per annum over the next 4 years as detailed below.

• There will also be necessary investment to cover the cost of the new 5-year External Audit contract negotiated nationally by PSAA. The cost has increased substantially (151%) in recognition of the need to provide a more effective local authority audit regime and address the substantial problem of audit backlogs.

• More generally and where appropriate, support services will develop invest-to-save business cases where these can help services to improve customer satisfaction, improve efficiencies and/or achieve future financial savings. Programmes aimed at reducing the cost of agency staffing and absence management (sickness), achieving economies through improved procurement and contract management, and reducing Corporate Landlord (estates) costs are planned over the medium term.

• Investment into commercial property assets through the CAIF fund to maintain assets and optimise income.

• Investment in energy efficiency measures for the council’s operational estate with further phases of the Solar PV and decarbonisation programmes on the council’s corporate buildings.

Service Metrics

Corporate Support Functions provide:

• Administration of School Appeals, which can range from 300-500+ in a year.

• Financial advice to the 3 corporate directorates including support for over 250 Budget Managers, as well as 64 schools.

• Treasury Management (a partnership service) oversees up to £100m cash balances and associated investments, including over £0.5 billion money market transactions annually, and manages a loans portfolio of over £380 million.

• Internal Audit & Counter Fraud (a partnership service) provides over 1,000 audit days for circa 50 internal audit reviews providing assurance to management and the authority.

• HR and Learning & Development services are available to around 9,000 staff across the council and schools, including a comprehensive advisory, development and policy service to 730 people managers and 64 schools in the City.

• Health & Safety advice and support for all council services and schools including facilities management of hundreds of operational buildings.

• Management of the council’s commercial, operational and heritage estates consisting of hundreds of land and property sites.

• Processing of approximately 2,200 Stage 1 complaints and 1,400 compliments and investigation of approximately 200 Stage 2 complaints.

• Processing of approximately 1,700 Freedom of Information requests and over 200 detailed Subject Access Requests.

• Support for around 250 contract managers including the provision of targeted contract management support for higher risk contracts.

• Collection and recovery of over £200m Council Tax (and Council Tax Reduction Scheme) revenues from over 130,000 households.

• Collection and recovery of over £120m Business Rate income from over 11,000 businesses.

• Processing of around £100m Housing Benefit claims and managing the transfer to Universal Credit.

• Payroll services to over 9,000 staff across the council, schools and other external organisations.

• Processing over 200,000 payments to the council’s suppliers, SME’s and providers (Accounts Payable).

• Provision of banking, purchasing card and urgent payment services and the management of major corporate financial information systems.

Corporate Support Functions Budget Summary
2024/25 Net Expenditure / (Income)		2025/26 Budget					2025/26 Budgeted Contracted Staff
2024/25 Net Expenditure / (Income)	Service Area	Expenditure	Income	Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)	2025/26 Budgeted Contracted Staff
£m		£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	FTE
2.237	Cabinet Office	3.438	(0.637)	2.801	(0.504)	2.297	20.7
(0.024)	Corporate Leadership Office	0.488	-	0.488	(0.651)	(0.163)	6.0
3.964	Finance & Property	21.562	(13.756)	7.806	(2.865)	4.941	276.1
1.104	Governance & Law	7.158	(2.106)	5.052	(3.439)	1.613	96.5
1.705	People & Innovation	13.533	(0.168)	13.365	(11.815)	1.550	197.7
0.046	Contribution to Orbis	2.912	-	2.912	(2.848)	0.064	34.2
9.033	Corporate Support Functions Total (Excluding Centrally Managed Budgets)	49.091	(16.667)	32.424	(22.122)	10.302	631.2
(67.729)	Centrally Managed Budgets	107.523	(118.196)	(10.673)	(42.210)	(52.883)	0.0
(58.696)	Corporate Support Functions Total (Including Centrally Managed Budgets)	156.613	(134.862)	21.751	(64.332)	(42.581)	631.2

Corporate Support Functions 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown
Service Description	Employee Expenditure	Other Expenditure	Total Expenditure	Income From Fees, Charges & Rents	Other Income	Government Grants	Total Income	Total Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)
Service Description	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Cabinet Office
Economic Development	0.463	0.091	0.555	-	(0.142)	-	(0.142)	0.413	0.029	0.442
Tourism & Marketing	0.427	1.677	2.104	(0.254)	(0.171)	-	(0.425)	1.679	0.062	1.742
Policy, Partnerships & Scrutiny	0.562	0.217	0.779	-	(0.071)	-	(0.071)	0.709	(0.596)	0.113
Cabinet Office Total	1.453	1.986	3.438	(0.254)	(0.384)	-	(0.637)	2.801	(0.504)	2.297
Corporate Leadership Office
Chief Executives Office	0.457	0.014	0.471	-	-	-	-	0.471	(0.567)	(0.096)
Democratic Services	0.017	-	0.017	-	-	-	-	0.017	(0.084)	(0.067)
Corporate Leadership Office Total	0.474	0.014	0.488	-	-	-	-	0.488	(0.651)	(0.163)
Finance & Property
Architecture & Design	0.050	(0.096)	(0.046)	(0.004)	-	-	(0.004)	(0.050)	0.069	0.019
Audit & Business Risk	-	0.000	0.000	-	-	-	-	0.000	-	0.000
Business Operations	3.535	0.167	3.702	(0.005)	(0.126)	-	(0.131)	3.570	(2.524)	1.047
Corporate Procurement	0.003	(0.042)	(0.039)	-	-	-	-	(0.039)	0.039	0.000
Education Property Management	-	0.739	0.739	(0.022)	(0.039)	-	(0.060)	0.679	0.004	0.682
Estates Management	0.709	0.762	1.471	(9.668)	-	-	(9.668)	(8.198)	5.301	(2.896)
Facilities & Premises	-	5.809	5.809	(0.720)	-	-	(0.720)	5.089	(4.014)	1.075
Financial Services	2.526	0.331	2.856	(0.003)	(0.176)	-	(0.180)	2.677	(2.640)	0.037
Other Corporate Services	0.035	-	0.035	-	-	-	-	0.035	0.029	0.064
Revenues & Benefits	4.943	1.687	6.630	(0.556)	(0.543)	(1.893)	(2.992)	3.639	1.341	4.980
Asset Management	0.393	0.012	0.405	-	-	-	-	0.405	(0.472)	(0.067)
Finance & Property Total	12.192	9.370	21.562	(10.978)	(0.885)	(1.893)	(13.756)	7.806	(2.865)	4.941
Governance & Law
Bereavement Services	0.312	0.723	1.034	(0.084)	-	-	(0.084)	0.950	0.178	1.129
Democratic Services	0.470	0.082	0.553	-	(0.071)	-	(0.071)	0.482	(0.438)	0.044
Electoral Services	0.375	0.201	0.575	(0.005)	-	-	(0.005)	0.570	0.087	0.657
Land Charges	0.122	0.013	0.134	(0.302)	-	-	(0.302)	(0.168)	0.027	(0.140)
Legal Services	2.482	0.001	2.483	(0.398)	(0.152)	-	(0.550)	1.933	(2.132)	(0.198)
Mayor's Office	0.104	0.025	0.129	-	-	-	-	0.129	(0.127)	0.002
Members Allowances & Training	1.186	0.058	1.244	-	-	-	-	1.244	(1.162)	0.082
Political Administration Support	0.002	0.001	0.002	-	-	-	-	0.002	(0.006)	(0.004)
Registrars	0.847	0.038	0.885	(1.088)	(0.002)	(0.004)	(1.094)	(0.208)	0.197	(0.011)
Policy, Partnerships & Scrutiny	0.117	-	0.117	-	-	-	-	0.117	(0.065)	0.053
Governance & Law Total	6.016	1.142	7.158	(1.876)	(0.225)	(0.004)	(2.106)	5.052	(3.439)	1.613
People & Innovation
Business Partnering & Workforce Development	1.234	0.057	1.291	-	-	(0.005)	(0.005)	1.285	-	1.285
Communications	0.817	(0.098)	0.719	0.004	(0.000)	-	0.003	0.723	(0.634)	0.089
Communities	0.327	0.029	0.357	-	-	-	-	0.357	0.082	0.439
Facilities & Premises	2.085	4.974	7.059	(0.053)	(0.057)	-	(0.110)	6.950	(6.587)	0.362
Health, Safety & Wellbeing	0.731	(0.160)	0.571	-	(0.001)	-	(0.001)	0.570	-	0.570
HR Strategy, Policy & Projects	2.186	(0.221)	1.965	(0.009)	(0.026)	(0.003)	(0.039)	1.926	(3.268)	(1.342)
Performance	0.139	0.029	0.169	-	-	-	-	0.169	(0.273)	(0.104)
Programme Management	0.010	0.002	0.012	-	-	-	-	0.012	-	0.012
Schools Skills & Learning	0.218	0.027	0.245	(0.017)	-	-	(0.017)	0.228	0.042	0.270
Standards & Complaints	0.394	0.049	0.443	-	-	-	-	0.443	(0.435)	0.009
Information Technology & Digital	0.628	0.075	0.702	-	-	-	-	0.702	(0.742)	(0.040)
People & Innovation Total	8.770	4.763	13.533	(0.075)	(0.084)	(0.009)	(0.168)	13.365	(11.815)	1.550
Contribution to Orbis Partnership
Contribution to ORBIS Services	-	2.912	2.912	-	-	-	-	2.912	(2.848)	0.064
Contribution to Orbis Partnership Total	-	2.912	2.912	-	-	-	-	2.912	(2.848)	0.064
Corporate Support Functions Total	28.904	20.187	49.091	(13.183)	(1.577)	(1.906)	(16.667)	32.424	(22.122)	10.302

Centrally Managed Budgets 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown
Service Description	Employee Expenditure	Other Expenditure	Total Expenditure	Income From Fees, Charges & Rents	Other Income	Government Grants	Total Income	Total Budget Allocation	Capital Charges & Recharges	Net Expenditure / (Income)
Service Description	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Capital Charges	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	(44.113)	(44.113)
Contingency	-	2.408	2.408	-	-	-	-	2.408	-	2.408
Financing Costs	-	15.937	15.937	-	(3.309)	-	(3.309)	12.628	-	12.628
Insurance Premiums	0.666	3.682	4.348	-	-	-	-	4.348	(4.428)	(0.080)
Levies & Precepts	-	0.249	0.249	-	-	-	-	0.249	-	0.249
Other Corporate Services	2.155	(2.288)	(0.133)	(0.025)	(1.659)	-	(1.684)	(1.817)	6.148	4.331
Unringfenced Grants	-	-	-	-	-	(29.188)	(29.188)	(29.188)	-	(29.188)
Housing Benefit Transfer Payments	-	84.714	84.714	(1.760)	-	(82.254)	(84.015)	0.699	0.182	0.881
Centrally Managed Budgets Total	2.821	104.701	107.523	(1.786)	(4.968)	(111.442)	(118.196)	(10.673)	(42.210)	(52.883)

Corporate Support Functions Budget Plan
Section & Service Area	Summary of Budget Proposal/Strategy	Delivery Risk & Impact	Savings Proposals 2025/26
Section & Service Area	Summary of Budget Proposal/Strategy	Delivery Risk & Impact	£m
Cabinet Office
Tourism & Venues - VisitBrighton	Bring VisitBrighton public relations function in-house.	Impact on existing resource capacity.	0.025
Tourism & Venues	Reduce VisitBrighton marketing budget and further reduce resources focused on conference sales.	Reduction of marketing could impact on the local tourist economy and income for VisitBrighton, hotels and venues.	0.075
Cabinet Office Total			0.100
Finance and Property
Audit (MOBO) - This budget relates to several small items including National Anti-Fraud Network (NAFN) and training retained by BHCC. All other Internal Audit budgets are held within Orbis (See 'Contribution to Orbis'.	Proposal to remove this budget. Only small amounts of expenditure are historically charged to this budget and can instead be covered in the Orbis operational budget.	Low risk.	0.010
Education Property Management - In-house maintenance budget	Reduce the in-house maintenance budget for education capital.	Will continue to meet statutory requirements, but slight reduction in budget. Low risk.	0.010
Estates Management - Estates	Slipper Baths: Sport & Leisure service to obtain vacant possession from current occupants (nursery, Freedom Leisure, secure residential tenant) delivering building-related savings. Once vacant possession is obtained, options to relet or sell (preferred) property will be explored.	Risk of delivering vacant possession due to secure tenancy although there is a current solution in place. Time delay and costs in disposal.	0.020
Estates Management - Estates	Beech Cottage: Service-led relocation of Health & Adult Social Care team in occupation, delivering building-related savings. Once vacant possession is obtained, options to relet or sell property will be explored.	Service-led dependency leading to delays obtaining vacant possession, delays in disposal; costs incurred in achieving both.	0.005
Housing Benefit Administration Grant (within Corporate Unringfenced Grants)	A transfer of work to the Department of Work & Pensions over the next two years results a reduction of workload and therefore the ability to review and reduce resources accordingly. This is expected to result in approximately 8.5 FTE reduction in 2025/26.		0.300
NNDR Running Expenses	Availability of new database analysis services to review database integrity issues will result in administration efficiencies that can be realised when the contract is procured in 2025/26.	Risk: Other authorities are using new to the market data analysis services to highlight database integrity issues e.g. small business rate relief misrepresentation, empty premises anomalies, pending closures. Current contract ends in 2025 and can be replace by more effective and cheaper alternatives. Will require some work to get new arrangements in place. Costs will further reduce in 2026/27.	0.020
Welfare Reform - The organisation of local authority response to cost of living and welfare demands. Responding to government monitoring. Data Analysis to enable targeted welfare responses. Provision of resource and linkage to mental health and debt advice aspects of the response.	Review the Welfare Reform funding model to reduce delivery costs. The use of alternative funding, such as the Household Support Fund, to fund preventative services will mitigate against the reduction of the service delivery	Risk: The realisation of this saving is dependent on the Cabinet's allocation of welfare funding for 2025/26 including the Fairness Fund incorporating the 2025/26 Household Support Fund.	0.290
Finance and Property Total			0.655
Governance and Law
Elections	A service redesign is proposed which will consider staffing levels required following continued process efficiencies, the Elections Act delivery and completion of ward/parliamentary boundary reviews. Service levels will be maintained despite a leaner structure.	Risks: Service levels are not anticipated to be impacted.	0.015
Legal Services - Commercial Services	Generation of increased income by restructuring fees for commercial leases (£0.055m). A service redesign will also aim to achieve staffing efficiencies of approximately 1.2 FTE (£0.050m) with work to be absorbed by the wider Team, supported by increasing use of new technologies.	Risk: If there is a reduction in commercial lease work the increased fees would be impacted. There is a potential impact on speed of service where work from reduced staffing resources is absorbed by the wider team. The reduction is however in non-litigation areas to mitigate the impact to the council of any service delays.	0.105
Life Events - Coroner Services & Registrar Services	A 4.6% staffing vacancy factor will be applied across the service to reflect and manage turnover rates of staff.	Risk: Reduces available resources to manage demands and meet statutory duties but is based on prevailing turnover rates which are currently being managed.	0.012
Governance and Law Total			0.132
People and Innovation
Corporate Performance & Risk	Discontinuation of third-party Corporate Performance & Risk software, instead developing in-house solutions making best use of available digital tools.	This saving has partially been delivered already with the de-commissioning of the previous system.	0.018
Customer and Performance	Reduction in the level of support provided in reporting the quarterly performance information, and streamlining the system used to report on the Council Plan delivery, which will reduce the resource capacity within the Corporate Risk & Performance Team.	The Corporate Performance & Risk staffing resources will be reduced. This team plays a key role in corporate governance including ensuring clear oversight of the delivery of the Council Plan and evidencing our statutory responsibility of continuous improvement, and therefore the remaining resource will ensure the statutory function is fulfilled.	0.020
Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Team	The Learning & Organisational Development team and the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion team are being bought together under the organisational redesign. The team will be redesigned as well as undertaking further work to consider functional alignment in bringing together equality work undertaken across the council. These changed are expected to reduce the resources across both teams by approximately 1.5 FTE.	Whilst this is a resource reduction, there will be plans put in place to ensure a robust offer on equalities across the organisation. Some impacts maybe related to direct support provided to managers but further work will continue to mitigate the impact.	0.050
Facilities & Building Services - Courier service	Modernise and redesign in-house courier service . This will involve restructuring and reduction in existing staffing resources of approximately 1.5 FTE and reshaping of roles.	Will involve restructuring and reduction in existing staffing resources of approximately 1.5 FTE and reshaping of roles.	0.051
Facilities & Building Services - Print	Small in-house confidential print service to cease. Confidential print services will continue only on a case-by-case basis, and it is proposed that any future service would be accompanied by a charge.	Prudent target set to manage risk.	0.006
Health & Safety and Occupational Health - Provision of competent H&S advice in accordance with legislation, maintaining the councils H&S Policy, Standards & safety management framework Team Safety and undertaking a programme of audit activity to report on assurance. Carrying out incident investigations & reporting to the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) in accordance with legislation	Reduction in cost relating to efficiencies based on review and exploitation of opportunities in relation to technology including a potential staff resourcing reduction.	Risks: Any potential redesign of the service will require careful risk management to ensure all activities and functions of the department can be maintained and BHCC Health, Safety and Wellbeing, and governance and assurance continues to be provided securing legislative compliance. Higher risk Health, Safety and Wellbeing issues and concerns linked to risk management is prioritised with the resource across the department.	0.030
HR Reward, Policy, Strategy, Advisory and Business Partnering - Delivery of the full HR service, including policy changes, advisory services and Business Partnering ensuring the organisation is supported with BAU support, and the development of strategies, plans and actions to develop the workforce of the future and enabling transformation and modernisation	Reduction of HR Consultant capacity within Advisory services , with support for managers to self-serve wherever possible. Workloads will be rebalanced between teams to enable this reduction to be absorbed.	Risks: The reduction in HR Advisory capacity will reduce the amount of support to the organisation on complex case work and Industrial relations. Our culture change work, which will support managers and make clear expectations and roles for all leaders, will define how managers will work in a more confident, autonomous way, focused on building psychological safety and early resolution of issues that may currently result in formal case work.	0.049
Information Rights Team	Explore the use of artificial intelligence to speed up the redactions related processes along with other process reviews within the team, to reduce the staffing resource across the team	Risks: Options will be explored and embedded, this is in line with the hope that current significant demand will fall back to 2023/24 levels. Not delivering on statutory functions has risks related to customer dissatisfaction, risk to reputation, financial fines from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), but a proportionate approach will be taken that prioritises high risk cases, working closely with legal to reduce risk of complaint to the ICO.	0.035
Learning & Organisational Development - Delivery of Organisational Development and training for the organisation and wider social care sector. Supports the organisation to transform and modernise, develop skills for the future workforce and ensure current training and development is delivered to maintain necessary skills	The Learning & Organisational Development team and the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion team are being bought together under the organisational redesign. The team will be redesigned as well as undertaking further work to consider functional alignment in bringing together equality work undertaken across the council. These changed are expected to reduce the resources across both teams by approximately 1.5 FTE.	Redesign of HR will be required as part of the formation of People & Innovation directorate. A restructure will ensure that essential work is covered, and prioritisation enables workloads to be managed. There will be a re-focusing of the way we work with the organisation.	0.030
People and Innovation Total			0.289
Contribution to Orbis
Orbis Internal Audit - Internal Audit and Counter Fraud.	Through generation of income, Orbis Internal Audit is aiming for an efficiency saving which will be a permanent reduction to Orbis operational budget		0.015
Orbis Services - Orbis Services refers to the Orbis Operational Budget which covers Internal Audit, Procurement and the Integrated elements of IT&D, as well as Finance 'Centres of Expertise' for Treasury and Insurance. The contribution is based on an agreed contribution ratio (ACR) as specified in the Inter-Authority Agreement (IAA). There are also Sovereign-held budgets managed by Orbis services on behalf of the partners but where overall control rests with the funding authority (these are known as 'Mobo' budgets).	The partners have indicated that savings will be expected from the partnership from implementation of the new Procurement partnership model of service and a reduced central Orbis Finance team are expected to deliver a reduced contribution to Orbis.	Risk: The Procurement service model has already been widely consulted on and is in implementation phase. Savings are expected to be achievable with minimal impact on service. Potential staffing reductions can fall in any or all of the partner authorities. Any redundancy costs are shared by the partners proportionately.	0.100
Contribution to Orbis Total			0.115
Corporate Support Functions Total			1.291

Corporate Support Functions Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30
	Profiled Payments 2025/26	Profiled Payments 2026/27	Profiled Payments 2027/28	Profiled Payments 2028/29	Profiled Payments 2029/30
	£m	£m	£m	£m	£m
Approved Schemes
Statutory DDA Access Works Fund	0.035	-	-	-	-
Corporate Fire Risk Assessments	0.070	-	-	-	-
Legionella Works	0.025	-	-	-	-
Madeira Terrace Structural Repairs	0.075	-	-	-	-
Solar Panels Corporate Buildings	0.358	-	-	-	-
Cemeteries Structural Works	0.065	-	-	-	-
Workstyles Phase 4	0.416	-	-	-	-
Building Security	0.013	-	-	-	-
Moulsecoomb Hub and Housing – Workstyles 4	11.313	-	-	-	-
CNF - Schools Energy Efficiency Reinvestment fund	0.325	-	-	-	-
CNF - Water Efficiency Fund	0.020	-	-	-	-
CNF - Carbon Reduction Measures to Operational Buildings	1.500	0.532	-	-	-
Hove Town Hall PMB	0.189	-	-	-	-
Imperial Arcade PMB	0.039	-	-	-	-
Mile Oak Community Centre PMB	0.120	-	-	-	-
Historic Madeira Lift PMB	0.050	-	-	-	-
Corporate Landlord Essential works	0.150	-	-	-	-
Computer Aided Facilities Management (CAFM) System	0.050	-	-	-	-
Access Improvements to Corporate Buildings	0.155	-	-	-	-
Identified Schemes Not Yet approved
Managing Staff Changes (Restructure / Redundancy)	1.250	1.250	0.500	0.500	-
Modernisation Enablers	1.150	1.150	1.000	1.000	-
Invest to Save (4-year plans)	2.600	2.600	1.500	1.500	-
Asset Management Fund	1.000	1.000	1.000	1.000	1.000
Planned Maintenance of operational buildings	1.500	1.500	1.500	1.500	1.500
Planned Maintenance - Social Services Buildings	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500	0.500
Commercial Asset Investment Fund (CAIF)	0.750	0.750	0.750	0.750	0.750
Total Corporate Support Functions	23.718	9.282	6.750	6.750	3.750

Reserves & Provisions
Description	Estimated Balance as at 01/04/25 £m	Planned Use 2025/26 £m	Estimated Balance as at 31/03/26 £m
General Fund Reserves
General Fund Working Balance/General Reserves	6.749	1.125	7.874
Library PFI Reserve	0.660	(0.143)	0.517
Waste PFI Project Reserve	7.932	(1.227)	6.705
Section 106 Receipts (Revenue)	0.320	-	0.320
Developer Contributions Unapplied (S106 Capital)	0.171	-	0.171
ICT Investment Reserve	0.472	(0.230)	0.242
Winter Maintenance	0.500	-	0.500
Dome Planned Maintenance	0.178	-	0.178
Hove Park 3G Pitch Renewal	0.015	-	0.015
Surface Water Management Reserve	0.382	0.039	0.421
Sports Facilities Reserve	0.549	(0.200)	0.349
Licensing - other reserve	0.008	(0.008)	-
Taxi Licensing	0.041	(0.020)	0.021
Trading Standards Seized Goods	0.007	-	0.007
Stanmer Park Parking Surplus	0.250	-	0.250
East Brighton Parking Surplus	0.070	-	0.070
Preston Park Parking Surplus	0.360	-	0.360
Overdown Rise Footpath Maintenance	0.020	-	0.020
HMO Licensing Fees Reserve	0.492	(0.078)	0.414
Phoenix House Sinking Fund	0.060	(0.060)	-
Damage Deposit Guarantee Scheme	0.094	-	0.094
Royal Pavilion & Museums Trust Sinking Fund	0.210	-	0.210
Travellers Site Capital Reserve	0.079	(0.079)	-
Restructure Redundancy Reserve	0.126	-	0.126
Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) - Neighbourhood reserve	0.612	-	0.612
CIL - Strategic reserve	1.565	(0.184)	1.381
Total General Fund Reserves	21.922	(1.065)	20.857
HRA Reserves
HRA Working Balance	3.000	-	3.000
HRA General Reserves	8.657	-	8.657
Estate Development Budget Reserves	0.183	(0.080)	0.103
Responsive Repairs Catch Up Works	0.285	(0.285)	-
Disrepair Claim Reserve	1.000	-	1.000
Total HRA Reserves	13.125	(0.365)	12.760
Schools / DSG Reserves
Schools LMS Balances	(5.500)	-	(5.500)
Total Schools / DSG Reserves	(5.500)	-	(5.500)
TOTAL RESERVES	29.547	(1.430)	28.117
General Fund Provisions
Hostel Accommodation Dilapidations	0.082	-	0.082
10 Year lease revenue costs Provision	0.075	-	0.075
Voluntary Severance Provision	0.600	(0.600)	-
Insurance Provision	3.871	-	3.871
Total General Fund Provisions	4.628	(0.600)	4.028
TOTAL ALL FUNDS	34.175	(2.030)	32.145

Summary of MTFS Assumptions
	2025/26	2026/27	2027/28	2028/29
Pay inflation and pay related matters:
- Provision for pay award	2.75%	2.50%	2.50%	2.50%
- Employers pension contribution rate change	0.00%	0.00%	0.00%	0.00%
General inflation:
- Inflation on social care third party payments	3.00%	2.50%	2.50%	2.50%
- Inflation on non pay expenditure	1.00% - 3.50%	1.00% - 3.00%	1.00% - 2.50%	1.00% - 2.50%
- Inflation on waste PFI	3.50%	3.50%	3.50%	3.50%
- Inflation on income	3.00%	3.00%	3.00%	2.50%
- Inflation on parking income	3.00%	3.00%	3.00%	2.50%
- Inflation on penalty charge notices	0.00%	0.00%	0.00%	0.00%
Resources:
Change to Revenue Support Grant (RSG)	3.97%	1.63%	1.64%	1.98%
Business rates poundage inflation uplift	1.70%	1.60%	1.60%	2.00%
Assumed council tax threshold increase	2.99%	2.99%	2.99%	2.99%
Adult Social Care Precept	2.00%	2.00%	2.00%	2.00%
Council Tax Base	1.70%*	0.75%	0.75%	0.50%

Revenue Budget Summary

2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown

Budget changes from 2024/25 to 2025/26

2025/26 Revenue Budget – Gross Budget to Net Budget

Specific Government Grants 2025/26

Investment to support Corporate Plan Commitments and Service Pressures 2025/26

Summary of Directorate Budget Plans

Summary of Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30

Families, Children & Wellbeing

Families, Children & Wellbeing Budget Summary

Families, Children & Wellbeing 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown

Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown

Families, Children & Wellbeing Budget Plan

Families, Children & Wellbeing Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30

Homes & Adult Social Care

Homes & Adult Social Care Budget Summary

Homes & Adult Social Care 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown

Housing Revenue Account (HRA) 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown

Homes & Adult Social Care Budget Plan

Homes & Adult Social Care - GF Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30

Homes & Adult Social Care - HRA Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30

City Operations

City Operations Budget Summary

City Operations 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown

City Operations Budget Plan

City Operations Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30

Corporate Support Functions

Corporate Support Functions Budget Summary

Corporate Support Functions 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown

Centrally Managed Budgets 2025/26 Revenue Budget Breakdown

Corporate Support Functions Budget Plan

Corporate Support Functions Capital Investment Programme 2025/26 to 2029/30

Summary of Reserves & Provisions

Medium Term Financial Strategy 2025/26 to 2028/29

Glossary of Terms

Medium Term Financial Strategy 2025 to 2029
	2025/26	2026/27	2027/28	2028/29
	£m	£m	£m	£m
Net Budget Requirement B/Fwd	0.246	0.265	0.278	0.287
Remove net one-off short term funding and expenditure	0.000	0.001	-	-
Adjusted Budget Requirement B/Fwd	0.247	0.265	0.278	0.287
Standard Pay and Inflation – Expenditure	0.013	0.012	0.013	0.013
Standard Inflation – Income	(0.003)	(0.003)	(0.004)	(0.003)
Investment in priorities across Homes & Adult Social Care services	0.008	0.008	0.009	0.010
Investment in priorities across Families, Children & Wellbeing services	0.007	0.004	0.004	0.003
Investment in priorities across City Operations services	0.006	0.003	0.004	0.003
All other priority investments	0.003	0.002	0.002	0.002
Increase in Social Care funding	(0.004)	-	-	-
Increase in Homelessness Prevention Grant	(0.003)	-	-	-
New Homes Bonus - One-off allocation	(0.001)	0.001	-	-
Extended Producer Responsibility grant	(0.005)	0.003	0.003	-
Net impact of Additional Employer National Insurance	0.001	-	-	-
Other Grant changes	(0.001)	-	-	-
Commitments including impacts of previously approved decisions	0.011	0.005	(0.001)	(0.000)
Expectation of future additional grants (Social Care & Homelessness)	-	(0.005)	(0.004)	(0.005)
2025/26 Risk provision	0.002	(0.002)	-	-
Subtotal	0.281	0.293	0.302	0.309
Available funding (below)	(0.265)	(0.278)	(0.287)	(0.296)
Budget Shortfall	0.016	0.016	0.016	0.013
Use of one-off Household Support Fund (HSF) Funding for Preventative Services	(0.001)	-	-	-
Transformation and Savings Plans	(0.016)	(0.016)	(0.016)	(0.013)
Budget Requirement C/Fwd	0.265	0.278	0.287	0.296
Available funding:
Revenue Support Grant (RSG)	0.009	0.009	0.009	0.009
Locally retained Business Rates	0.062	0.064	0.065	0.066
Net Collection Fund position	(0.004)	-	-	-
Council Tax including Adult Social Care Precepts	0.198	0.205	0.213	0.220
Total Funding	0.265	0.278	0.287	0.296