Wiltshire Council’s second formal update of the 2024/25 financial year shows that its previous forecast overspend has been reduced.

Previously, the council had a forecast overspend of around £8.2m for the year, but the quarter two forecast position has dropped to around £861k.

The cabinet member for finance, Cllr Nick Botterill, described the current economic climate as “a challenging and somewhat unpredictable time for local authority finances”.

This update was given at the cabinet meeting in Trowbridge County Hall, on Tuesday, November 19.

Cllr Botterill said he was “very, very, very pleased” and noted that, in the context of the whole budget, the forecast overspend was now “a very small percentage in our net budget of almost half a billion pounds”.

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The leader of Wiltshire Council, Richard Clewer.The leader of Wiltshire Council, Richard Clewer. 

He told attendees that financing adult social care “continues to be challenging” but that he was “quite confident” the council will produce a balanced budget by the end of the financial year.

Since the first quarter, the area of adult services is forecast to overspend around £1.6m less than the previous quarter – with the current total forecast overspend at £6.2m.

Local authorities across the country are struggling with the cost of social care, particularly adult services – with increased demand and the increasing cost of care packages, particularly for cases that are complex.

According to the council, it has put in place a number of cost mitigation actions through spend reviews and additional actions to bring the figure down.

Speaking at the meeting, the leader of Wiltshire Council, Richard Clewer, said: “I think it is really good to see the work that officers have put in here to address the budget issues that occurred, to make sure that we now have that under control and we are well on course to end the year, as we always do, with a balanced budget, and ideally, with a small element of surplus.”

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In a statement released afterwards, Cllr Botterill added: “This continues to be a challenging and somewhat unpredictable time for local authority finances; however, our preventative way of working puts us in a stronger position than most and we are well equipped to mitigate any problems.

“Therefore, we are confident that we will be on budget at the end of the financial year without the need to use any of our reserves.

“Like councils across the country, areas such as adult social care continue to put pressures on finances, but we are focussed as ever on being a self-sustaining authority that lives within its means, and we’ve put measures in place that have already seen our forecast significantly improve.

“We remain ambitious, and we continue to invest in other key services such as our roads, with our capital programme focussed on improving the infrastructure of our county.

“So that means investment in schools, highways, council house building and our leisure services – including delivering a brand-new leisure centre for our county town.”

The council also reported achieving almost 43 per cent of its £19.6m saving targets of the year so far, amounting to around £8.4m.

According to the current forecast, around £2.8m of the savings target is not expected to be delivered by the financial year’s end.

Additionally, an update was heard on the council’s capital programme, currently sitting at around £226.35m, down from the £255.6m figure originally agreed at the full council meeting in February.

Referring to the recent budget survey which asked residents where the council should prioritise its spending, Cllr Botterill said: “Taking into account the in-person and online engagement we were nearly at 1,900 responses, which is very encouraging.

“The feedback provides a useful snapshot of what people think and that type of insight will help to inform our future plans.”