Council accounts predict overspend due to pressure from adults and children’s services

This has been driven by a £4.7m overspend on adult social care and a £3.8m overspend on children’s services. Underspends in other areas have covered much of this.

However, at a cabinet meeting, portfolio holder for finance, Cllr Nick Oliver, said the numbers were moving in the right direction.

He said: “This report is forecasting as of the end of December a £1.7m overspend to the year end, but I would just like to stress that it probably is not a reason to for concern. The previous report was £3.3m and the report before that was £7.5m. The trend line is definitely heading in the right direction.

“We’re looking at a £4.7m overspend in adult services. That includes an integrated commissioning overspend of £6.9m, so that is a demand led cost to the council.

“With children’s services, which is our other big spending area and one of our key services, we’re forecasting a £3.8m overspend. This is driven by rising demand for external placements.

“We’re also facing rising costs due to rising energy costs and national insurance. We’re facing challenging demand increases.”

In previous years, the council has forecasted a similar overspend at this time before delivering a balanced budget by the end of the year. In April 2025, the accounts for the same period anticipated a £3 million overspend, but a balanced budget was achieved by the end of the financial year.

A report presented to the cabinet stated that there are currently 264 cases in Northumberland where the annual cost of care for a client is over £100,000. This represents an increase of 32 from December 2024.

There are 80 children in external residential places, six more than March 2025. The average weekly cost of a placement has risen from £6,052 per week in May 2025 to £6,592.

Furthermore, the “increasing complexity” of individuals involved means that 27% of those placements require additional support packages – up from 16% at the start of the financial year.