Hampshire children’s services to lose 185 staff as budget slashed by almost £25m

Hampshire County Council is to slash almost £25m from its children’s services budget, as part of a restructure and efficiency savings drive that will see 185 staff lose their jobs.

According to a council report, the savings will “offset” government cuts and increasing demand for services.

The council’s area-based grant (ABG) from the Department for Education has already been reduced by £4.9m this year, and local officials are predicting that further cuts to grants will leave children’s services almost £16m out of pocket next year.

Increasing numbers of looked-after children and demand for home-to-school transport are also expected to cost the council an extra £3m.

The restructure will see 46 senior management posts scrapped, which equates to 22 per cent of the total management posts in the department.

The other posts to be abolished represent five per cent of the remaining children’s services workforce.

These include 25 jobs to go in the youth service team that delivers information, advice and guidance in schools and four jobs to go in the social work team responsible for children with behavioural, emotional or social difficulties.

Despite this, no social workers in direct child protection services will lose their job.

David Kirk, Hampshire County Council’s lead member for children’s services, said the authority is facing “unprecedented financial challenges”.

“Along with the requirement to make significant savings, we must balance the need to ensure we continue to deliver high-quality services, to keep children and young people in Hampshire safe, and to maintain a vibrant educational system,” he explained.

“In this current financial climate, therefore, it is inevitable we will have to make cuts to posts across the department.”

He added that staff could be redeployed to work in other parts of the council, claiming that compulsory redundancy will be a last resort.

“Successive inspections and inspectorate reports over the past few years have confirmed, thanks to the hard work and dedication of our staff, good and outstanding services for children and young people in Hampshire with the strong capacity to improve,” Kirk said.

“While we need to streamline services, making the best possible use of resources, we remain committed to delivering high-quality services.”