How Hartlepool Borough Council aims to make nearly £10m of budget savings by 2025

Hartlepool Borough Council officers say they face an estimated £9.750million deficit across 2023-24 and 2024-25 - with more than 80% coming in the first year.

Finance chiefs said the deficit more than doubled since the June estimate due to inflation, which was “initially driven by high energy and fuel costs and is now spreading into other cost areas and pay settlements”.

They added this comes off the back of previous budget pressures such as the previous financial crisis, austerity and Covid-19.

Meetings are to be held in the coming weeks looking at how the council will balance the budget for next year, starting with finance and policy committee on Monday, November 21.

One-off reserves and temporary investment income is planned to be used to phase the challenges more evenly over the next two years and defer a small amount to 2025-26.

This would leave the council with a revised deficit of £4.076million to tackle in 2023-24.

Officers say they have so far outlined £3.607million of savings councillors could adopt, leaving £469,000 more to be found.

A report from director of resources and development Chris Little said the challenges facing Hartlepool are affecting the whole of the public sector nationally.

It said: “The council cannot continue to rely upon one off measures to support the budget.

“It is therefore essential that a robust saving plan is put in place to achieve recurring savings.”

A further report will come before councillors in December with an update on potential savings and feedback from other committees.