Report of the Executive Director of Adult Social Services

The Council is forecasting an estimated budget shortfall of £44m in 2023/24, £85m in 2024/25, and £112m by 2025/26. After the use of c£16m smoothing reserves in each of the three years, this reduces to £28m in 2023/24, £69m in 2024/25 and £96m by 2025/26. Officers have identified potential savings options to reduce the budget gap totalling £42.3m over three years.

This report sets out the priorities for the services in the remit of this committee and details the initial revenue budget changes proposed by officers.

Even after these proposals there remains a budget gap of £7m to close to get to a balanced budget in 2023/24 and further savings and cuts options will be required to be worked between now and January and be reported back to Scrutiny committees in February. Each scrutiny committee is invited to consider the current proposed changes which are within its remit and to make recommendations to the Executive before it agrees to the final budget proposals in February 2023.

The Committee considered the report of the Director Public Health and Interim Deputy Place Based Lead (Manchester) and the Executive Director of Adult Social Services that explained that these reports were the first in the cycle for the budget programme 2023-26. They set out an overview of the services within the remit of this scrutiny committee and the key priorities. The budget growth assumptions in the Medium-Term Financial Plan were set out. The report provided a draft set of officer proposals for further savings for 2023-26, developed in the context of the financial challenge facing the Council, for comments by Health Scrutiny.

Key points and themes in the report included:

·         Providing an overview of the service and priorities;

·         A description of the service budget and the proposed changes;

·         Describing the proposed savings programme;

·         Workforce implications;

·         Equality and Anti-Poverty Impact; and

·         Future opportunities, risk and policy considerations.

Some of the key points that arose from the Committee’s discussions were: -

·         Welcoming the very personal testimony given by the Executive Member for Healthy Manchester and Adult Social Care, adding that this evidenced how Councillors were aware of, and responding to the challenges experienced by many Mancunians;

·         That budget cuts imposed on the city had detrimental impacts on health outcomes and reduced the life expectancy of many Mancunians;

·         That continued budget cuts had a direct impact on the wider determinants of health outcomes; and

·         The importance of recognising that budget cuts had been imposed each year on the city for over ten years.

In response to a question regarding the savings proposal of £270k in Children’s Public Health the Director of Public Health explained that the commissioning intention was to review and revise the service model and specification. This would be co-designed with stakeholders including the Local Care Organisation and the Strategic Director of Children and Education Services. He stated that the intention was to protect frontline services. He advised that monitoring of all decisions would be undertaken by the Local Care Organisation Accountability Board.

In response to specific savings proposals related to transport services; access to day services and extra care charges, the Executive Director of Adult Social Services stated that any proposed changes would involve conversations with affected individuals and their families and that an Equalities Impact Assessment would be undertaken for each eventual budget decision taken, noting that a further report on the budget proposals would be presented to the Committee at their February 2023 meeting. The Committee further noted that the Better Outcomes Better Lives programme, an invest-to-save programme of service delivery, would continue to be reported to the Committee along with other transformation work.

In response to a comment regarding workforce, the Executive Director of Adult Social Services commented that the importance of this was fully understood, adding that despite the continued challenges there was a strong and positive culture amongst the workforce. She added that the staff were the best asset she had and paid tribute to them. She further commented that Manchester was contributing to the ongoing work at a Greater Manchester-level on the issue of staff retention. The Executive Member for Healthy Manchester and Adult Social Care echoed this statement and he further paid tribute to the senior leaders across the service.

In closing this item of business, the Chair recognised the difficult work undertaken by officers in bringing forward these proposals as they fully understood the impact these decisions had on residents. She welcomed the assurance given that conversations with effected individuals and their families would be had as any changes were implemented.

Decision

To note the report.