Baubles, bells and budgets

For all of its fun and festivity, December can be a challenging month for local authorities.

December is particularly difficult as our winter pressures really start to bite; when vulnerable adults feel particularly lonely and isolated and it can also be a difficult time for children in care.

While most people are thinking of baubles and bells or what date it's considered appropriate to put up the Christmas tree, many of you reading this will be focusing on budgets and backlogs.

Children's services are enduring relentless pressure, as funding for our services decreases whilst demand most definitely does not. The task of balancing council budgets is tougher than we have experienced before. In order to protect vital statutory services, early help and preventative services have, in some places, been severely reduced despite us knowing that we can make the strongest difference to children and young people by intervening earlier before problems become worse and reach crisis point.

As a director of children's services, and in my case of adults services too, you become somewhat accustomed to working in challenging environments. On Monday 5th December, ADCS published Phase 5 of its Safeguarding Pressures research which highlights just how challenging 2015/16 has been. For the year ending 31st March 2016: