Last updated:
28th October 2024
What we're doing about our financial situation
How we're making savings and changes
We continue to make savings each year, reducing costs and being more efficient. These are our savings made in recent years.
| Financial year | Saving |
| 2019/20 | £3.3m |
| 2020/21 | £4.6m |
| 2021/22 | £6.3m |
| 2022/23 | £5.1m |
| 2023/24 | £11.8m |
| 2024/25 (projected) | £11.6m |
| 2025/26 (projected) | £5.7m |
| Total | £48.4m |
Reducing staffing costs
- Considerable staff reductions made in 2023/24, saving more than £3m
- Further proposals and staff reductions in 2024/25 mean we should see savings of about £7million, as well as more savings in the years after that
Lobbying for fairer funding
We continue to lobby Government, calling for a fairer funding deal for areas like Wokingham borough. This is the situation:
- We get £48million less than the average unitary council providing all services to its residents
- We think this puts an unfair burden on our Council Taxpayers, just because they pay their Council Tax
- Funding for local councils is based on a formula that is more than ten years old and does not take into account the true cost of providing services within adults and children social care locally
Our Fair Funding deal campaign last year saw more than 1,000 residents send letters to the Government calling for change. The campaign called for:
- A new funding model
- Longer funding settlements for better long-term planning
- Funding matching inflation and general cost increases
- Take into account local needs in adult and children’s social care
We continue to lobby the new Government for a better funding model for councils.
