Barnet Council is to receive £55.7m in government support as part of its financial plans to close the council’s budget gap for the next year.
The Leader of the Council, Cllr Barry Rawlings, received notice on Thursday afternoon (20 February) of the decision by the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government that the council’s application for ‘exceptional financial support’ was granted.
In December, the council made the application for £55.7m from government to meet its projected budget shortfall of £55.7m for the financial year 2025-26. The gap is a consequence of the unprecedented financial crisis facing all local government, and in spite of the council already finding £23m of efficiency savings for the next financial year.
Cllr Barry Rawlings welcomed the news but cautioned that the government support is a temporary solution:
“We’re grateful to the government for granting our application for exceptional financial support to help us close our budget shortfall for the next 12 months, and for their understanding about the pressures the sector faces. The support will provide immediate relief as we set a balanced budget and work on plans for a sustainable council given the ongoing demands on our budget.
“The pressure on our finances has never been greater. As a council, we face an unprecedented crisis in financing our services, driven by a perfect storm of a decade of funding cuts from central government, high interest rates making services more expensive to deliver, and ever-increasing demand for complex and costly services we have a legal duty to provide, such as adults’ and children’s social care and temporary accommodation.
“We will need to repay any portion of the government support that we use in the form of borrowing, which will further stretch budgets, so this is a temporary solution and will mean tough decisions for some time. We will be regularly engaging with residents to understand what is most important to you, so we can reshape services to focus on those things and deliver them even more cost-effectively.”
The council’s proposed budget for the next financial year, including setting the rate of Council Tax, will be presented to Full Council for approval on Tuesday 4 March.