Let’s Fix It – for our children

Hello everyone. By now, you may have heard about our Let’s Fix It campaign to secure Bury a better financial deal from the Government.

The plain facts are these: we are facing a triple whammy of rising costs, increasing demand for services, and not enough financial support. We are in the bottom 20% for council funding. We are running on fumes, and we are calling on the Government to change the system so that Bury receives the money it needs and deserves.

This is our borough: the place we call home, the place we have our families, the place we work, rest and play in. Please join our campaign and sign our petition - all the details are here: Budget campaign petition.

Let me tell you what the current situation means for children’s social care, which accounts for a substantial amount of our budget.

The number of children in need of support from Bury Council is now at its highest since before the pandemic. And the number of children in care is now at its highest since records began in 1994, having been rising annually since 2009.

Plus, the complexity of children’s needs has also increased, which places additional pressure on councils and social workers, with more resources required to support each child and family.

A key pressure is the significant increase in the cost of placements for children in care. Nationally, expenditure on fostering and residential placements has gone up by nearly 40% in the last seven years.

One of the biggest challenges that councils face is the pressure on high needs areas. This is due to an ever-increasing demand for SEND support and the growing number of children who have an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) – up 9% since last year, and the number has increased every year since the plans were introduced.

So, we have several asks for the Chancellor when he makes his Autumn Statement.

On children’s social care: we call on him to meet existing cost pressures, including fully funded placements for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children and care leavers; properly fund measures to reduce the demand for placements; and introduce rules for the use of agency children’s social workers.

And on Special Educational Needs and Disabilities: provide additional funding to meet the year-on-year increase in demand for EHCP plans; guarantee that all council Dedicated Schools Grant deficits will be written off; and urgently bring forward legislation that gives councils the powers to lead local SEND systems and to hold health and education partners to account for their work supporting children and young people with special needs.

Meanwhile, is there anything that you could do? Actually, there is. Have you ever considered fostering or adopting a child?

Every young person that we can look after here in Bury, rather than sending away, saves a great deal of money. But it’s also much better for the child, being able to stay in their home town, where all their friends and social contacts are.

We have recently substantially increased the financial allowances we pay foster families, and put more support in place too – please see Fostering for more details.

We can all do our bit to make life better across Bury – that’s why we need to Fix It Together.