Risks to delivering these impacts The figures above provide reasons for long term optimism, if solutions to medium term financial pressure can be found. However, they should be treated with caution as they assume successful navigation of the complexity in the delivery of the high impact changes listed in sections 3 and 4. To illustrate the financial risk of not successfully navigating this complexity effectively, the analysis has been re-run assuming the impacts delivered are of half
Investment required in the system and implications for the prevention element of the new Children, Families, and Youth Grant The upfront investment required to deliver the priority changes at this scale – in workforce, services, technology, and partnership infrastructure – would need to be set against this figure to arrive at a net benefit. This is likely to be a combination of one-off funding to help transform the system, and recurrent or reallocated funding to enable families’ needs to be met earlier. When considering any net additional recurrent funding required, the evidence gathered by this programme most significantly points to more adults receiving support for their mental health, substance misuse or domestic abuse needs prior to children entering care or after. The evidence gathered in this report suggests the number of adults this applies to is 6,000 across county and CCN unitary member authorities, minimum . Further work would be required to understand the wider funding and operational landscape across adult social care, public health and NHS services (that support a much wider range of adults and outcomes). This would help determine whether the work could be delivered through prioritisation or greater efficiency of existing resources, or whether additional funding would be required. That investment analysis is beyond the scope of this report but is essential context for any financial planning based on these projections. That investment analysis is beyond the scope of this report but is essential context for any financial planning based on these projections. This work has not sought to comment on whether the magnitude of the prevention element of the new Children, Families, and Youth Grant is large enough to enable the shifts described in this report. However, if it is assumed that this funding is essential to deliver support that results in fewer children in the care system, this analysis suggests the grant needs to be continued beyond the current committed end date of financial year 2028/29 until 2032/33. Only at this point would local authorities be in the position to continue funding these services as a result of the financial benefits associated with fewer children needing to be in the care system.
the magnitude – 7.2% fewer children entering the care system and 1.1% more children exiting the care system. The analysis suggests the financial consequence of this (beyond the missed opportunity to deliver better outcomes for children, young people and families) would be that county authority expenditure on children in care placements still exceeds available budgets in 2035. This reduced financial impact is illustrated in Figure 28 below:
Whilst a £2.4bn cumulative benefit would be delivered, compared to the scenario where historic trends continue, county and CCN unitary member authorities would still accrue a cumulative overspend on children in care placement expenditure of £4.9bn by 2035. This demonstrates the financial criticality of successfully delivering changes on the ground that meaningfully, positively impact outcomes for children who would currently experience In the context of LGR, the findings above have been scaled on a pro rata basis to demonstrate the potential financial impact for a representative population of 500,000. Based on the modelling conducted, this would lead to: • Current expenditure on homes for children in care of £60m per annum, growing to £88m per annum by 2035 if trends continue. being in the care system. Scaling the impacts • Successful implementation of the shifts could contain the growth in expenditure to £71m per annum by 2035, with cumulative benefits of £86m to that point. • Current overspend above budget would be £10m per annum and even with the shifts successfully implemented and impacts achieved, cumulative overspend to 2035 would be £50m (with ‘break even’ still achieved in 2033).
Figure 28: County authority children in care – number, budget and spend forecasts (half impact) County authority children in care – number, budget and spend forecasts (half impact)
£5,000
31000
£4,500
29000
£4,000
27000
£3,500
25000
£3,000
£2,500
23000
£2,000
21000
£1,500
19000
£1,000
17000
£500
£0
15000
Children looked after (CLA)
CLA forecast
Spend forecast (with impact) Forecast net CLA Number
Budget Spend
Budget forecast (do nothing) Spend forecast (do nothing)
66
67
Made with FlippingBook - Online catalogs