Budgets for 2025/26 for children, education and families services delivered and commissioned by Cambridgeshire County Council were scrutinised and supported by a majority of the children and young people committee members. Their view will be considered by the strategy, resources and performance committee which takes place on 28 January.
“The children and young people committee has a significant role in ensuring ‘children and young people have opportunities to thrive’ as part of our strategic framework and the council’s approach for achieving the vision of a greener, fairer and more caring Cambridgeshire,” said a council spokesperson.
Plans include:
- An additional £9million for children who become looked after
- £4.7million to support home to school transport services
- £340k to increase direct payment packages for children and young people with disabilities.
Other proposals include:
- Re-designing the way services are delivered to ensure they are as effective as possible and prioritising the reinvestment of resources into early intervention.
- This will help to reduce demand and alleviate children and young people’s complex needs. Improving outcomes for children and families by supporting more of them to make changes early on in their lives will help avoid statutory intervention.
- For example, a £490k investment is proposed to increase capacity and extend the county council’s work with partners in East Cambridgeshire to help keep children and their families safe.
- A proposed new residential strategy – where children do need to come into the care of the council – the aim is to better serve their needs through increased local residential capacity.
- A new approach to SEND – more effective partnership working with local schools and academy trusts, reviewing home to school transport routes to ensure transport is appropriate to need and routes are optimised.
At its meeting in December, members of the strategy, resources and performance committee began debating the draft business plan and budget.
This plan has now been scrutinised by the CYP committee.
The feedback from all the council’s January policy and service committees, as well as feedback from our online public consultation (Business Plan and Budget 2025-26 Consultation Survey | Cambridgeshire County Council) and the views of Town and Parish Councils, other local and public authorities, business representatives and trade unions will be debated again by the strategy, resources and performance committee when it meets in January.
This committee will then put forward the final draft business plan and budget for debate and decision at the full council meeting on 11 February.
Cambridgeshire County Council’s 2025/26 business plan and budget will identify where to spend more than £1billion to deliver services and support for residents and communities across the county.
“Rising demand for these services, along with the increased costs and changes from government, continues to impact the council’s available funding,” said the spokesperson.
“For 2025/26 we have a budget gap of £34.2million that we need to address. That means we must also continue to make difficult choices about levels of council tax and where we can generate additional income, as well as where we invest and where we make savings.”
Cllr Bryony Goodliffe, Chair of the Children and Young People Committee at Cambridgeshire County Council, said: “We recognise the financial challenges that we are facing as a county, this is particularly felt by councils across the country with more demand on SEND.
“In Cambridgeshire, between 2020 and 2024, there was a 70% increase in children with Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs), cost increases in home to school transport and in autism services over the same period.
“We’re working hard to tackle the increase in demand and the increase in costs, and I’m pleased we’re submitting these proposals for not only savings, but investment as well.
“We have a plan for the next five years and this includes new primary school builds and expansions, investment in secondary schools to provide new places, additional high needs education places and investment to create in-county residential homes for children.
“Although we do not receive sufficient funding from Government to meet the needs of the growing population in Cambridgeshire, we are committed to ensuring the council delivers value for money in the services it provides. That is why the majority of this committee supports the proposals today.”
Full council meets on 11 February.
For more information on the council’s proposals visit – County Council to spend more than £1billion across Cambridgeshire in the coming year | Cambridgeshire County Council
