Savings Monitoring 2025/26

		Gross Savings Achieved / Anticipated	In Year Pressures	Net Savings At Risk	Savings At Risk As A % Of Net Budget
	2025/26 Savings Proposed
Directorate	£'000	£'000	£'000	£'000	£'000
Families, Children & Wellbeing	3,460	2,276	(100)	1,284	1.6%
Homes & Adult Social Care	9,256	6,905	0	2,351	1.9%
City Operations	1,782	1,388	0	394	0.8%
Central Hub	1,291	1,154	0	137	0.4%
Centrally-held Budgets	0	0	0	0	0.0%
Total Directorate Savings	15,789	11,723	(100)	4,166	1.5%

Explanation and Mitigation of At Risk Savings

Directorate £'000	Savings at Risk £'000	Explanation and Mitigation Strategy
Families, Children & Wellbeing	1,284	The savings at risk predominantly relate to placements for children in care (£1.124m). This is the result of a relatively small number of children with extremely high cost placements due to their complex needs and requirement for specialised care. In addition, the prevailing market conditions have made the current framework contracts unattractive to providers and have resulted in the necessity to make more placements outside of the framework contract at higher rates. A further compounding factor is the ongoing difficulty in recruiting foster carers. The shortage of foster carers makes it problematic to place children in family settings, whether in-house or with external providers, forcing the need for more expensive care options.
Homes & Adult Social Care	2,351	Achieving savings will be challenging due to the ever-increasing demand and cost pressures across the directorate. £1.570m of savings at risk relates to Housing GF. Over 70% of savings within Housing rely on securing properties in the private rented sector, despite landlords exiting the market. Risks include finding affordable properties at scale and out of area, the need for resident decanting, lower-than-expected property voids, and landlord compliance.
City Operations	394	The majority of the savings at risk for City Operations primarily relate to income opportunities within Parking Services and City Parks and service redesigns across other service areas. The savings linked to income generation are dependent on the economy and as such will remain a risk for the foreseeable. A saving approved that related to the closure of Kings Road Paddling Pool has now been reversed, this will not be delivered and instead will need to be mitigated through other means in the TBM process for City Operations. Where savings are not achievable the service will continue to mitigate through monthly TBM monitoring.
Central Hub	137	The savings at risk for Central Hub is primarily savings relating to VisitBrighton (£0.100m). Reduced promotion of B&H potentially resulting in fewer conferences and reduced incomes for VisitBrighton, hotels and venues which will offset the savings. The other elements relate to coroner and registration services where BHCC has submitted proposal to West Sussex County Council to reduce its recharge for the services as well as Estates Management for Slipper Baths, the risk relates to time delay and costs in disposal of the property.
Centrally-held Budgets	0
Total General Fund	4,166