Since this council was created in 2009, we’ve reduced our spending by over £275 million by working more efficiently.
More recently, we have:
- stopped all but essential recruitment and spending
- reduced the number of senior managers and staff we employ
- reviewed how the council is organised, removing duplication, automating processes and reviewing IT licencing costs
These plans are forecast to reduce costs by £2.8 million in 2026/27, but they are not enough to plug the funding gap.
The following new efficiency proposals are included in the 2026/27 budget:
- not replenishing reserves by £8.5 million as had been planned
- explore voluntary redundancy, reducing hours and buying back additional annual leave with staff (£3.2 million)
Increasing income
- review and increase some fees and charges to increase council income (£1.5 million)
- increase crematorium fees in line with other crematoria (£36,000)
- review rental income from council properties to ensure they reflect market rates (£100,000)
- explore use of Continuing Health Care (CHC) income from the NHS, to make more use of how the CHC can reduce need for high-cost social care (£612,000)
- consider how the Biggleswade Adult Centre is used, to either reduce running costs or increase income (£60,000)
Reducing funding to other organisations
- remove or reduce the Ward Councillor Grants. Each Ward Councillor currently has up to £2,000 per year to spend on local community projects (£126,000)
- review grant allocations to the advice sector and reduce by 10%. The Council currently provides £363,000 to three Citizen’s Advice services and Advice Central (£36,000)
- cease funding for stroke support provided by the voluntary sector (£48,000 and £16,000 in 2027/28). This service is a health service, and the organisations will need to rely on other funding sources
- cease funding for lunch/day clubs (£20,000 and £20,000 in 2027/28). The council may use Public Health funding for 2026/27. These organisations will need to rely on other funding sources
- withdraw the additional £50,000 planned for carer support. The council will continue to provide £200,000 each year to provide support to carers through arrangements commissioned jointly across Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes and will also retain funding of £62,000 for our Digital Carers Support offer. This efficiency relates to the removal of planned additional support
- cease the contract for Community Health Services when the current contract ends in March 2026, as the NHS cannot tell us how this money is being used. This service will still be provided by the NHS, but the funding the council provides will stop (£500,000). Discussions are on-going with the Integrated Care Board (local NHS) and the current provider of the service in relation to the impact of this decision and how this will be managed and mitigated where possible
Changes to council services
- meet our statutory consultation obligations in communicating planning application consultations moving away from individual resident letters and focus on prominently displayed site notices in streets and in the press to ensure information remains visible and accessible. Parish and town councils will continue to be informed and can display on noticeboards (£22,000)
- reduce routine management and maintenance of 43 countryside sites to only focus on essential repairs where there is a danger to health and safety (£30,000)
- reduce the reablement and hospital discharge service by five posts – the service is currently provided by 81 full time equivalent staff (£135,000 and £68,000 in 2027/28). The impact of this change will be managed through changes to structure of the service but may mean that we have reduced capacity to support our hospital discharge arrangements.
- explore options to reduce the number of Overview and Scrutiny Committees and Sub-Committees and/or reduce the frequency of their meetings. This could result in fewer items being formally scrutinised outside the decision-making process, result in the grouping of a wider range of topics into fewer meetings and/or improve allocation of resource and focus on high priority topics (£42,000)
- share Registration Services with another council, subject to agreement between the relevant councils (£30,000)
- limit plans for building new facilities - the plans for 2026/27 create costs of approximately £33.7 million from our revenue/service budget. You can read more about the Capital Programme.
You can read the full set of draft efficiencies as part of the Executive Committee papers on our website (agenda item 7, appendix E(ii) and appendix E(iii)).
Further ideas that may be considered in future years
Government funding will reduce every year for the next three years, so we have to consider further cost-reduction options.
The council will review all services to help to identify more opportunities to reduce costs.
If any future changes to services have a significant impact on residents, we will undertake a public consultation, so everyone has an opportunity to comment before any decisions are made.