We are required by law to assess the needs of vulnerable adults either through direct providision of services or by commissioning services if their needs meet a national set of eligibility criteria.
In North Somerset, most of our adult social care services are commissioned from the independent and voluntary sector. One of our legal duties is to monitor the quality of these services to make sure that people are receiving the right support.
Around 2,500 people receive care each year. These services include:
At any one time, we are delivering services to the 40% of adults aged between 18 and 64 whose needs are becoming more complex as well as to the 60% of adults who are 65 and older.
In future, we expect demand for our services to rise further, with an increasing aging population - we project that the number of adults receiving care will go up by 30% by 2028.
Social work staff, including social workers and care assessors and occupational therapists, assess the needs of vulnerable adults and develop care plans, setting out the services that people require to support their needs. We have carried out over 6,700 care assessments in the last 12 months in hospitals or the community, and 1,200 occupational therapy assessments for disabled or older/frail adults.
Following a care assessment, staff commission services from either the council or independent or voluntary providers.
The council also support residents through the financial assessment process to ensure that the amount of money that they pay towards to the cost of their care is affordable and within the scope of the Care Act.
We have a duty to safeguard vulnerable adults and monitor and review care packages to make sure they are fit for purpose and meet people’s needs.
Most of this cost is funded by specific government grants and cannot be spent on other services.
We are required by law to provide a range of assessment, services and support to children and families under the Children Act, including the provision of care for children who cannot remain safely with their families.
In North Somerset, there are around 43,000 children and young people. At any one time we are supporting around:
140 children and families needing support from a family worker
240 children classed as in need of support and services from a social worker
133 children on a child protection plan which means they are at risk of or are experiencing significant harm/abuse
260 children in care – who cannot safely be cared for by their birth families
North Somerset has some areas which have higher levels of deprivation than the national average and this can contribute to the increasing demands on our children’s social care services, although there are also many other reasons for this, including the cost of living crisis. The number of children in care has risen by 15% since 2016 and their needs are more complex. Our social care staff work with schools and other agencies to support children in care and deliver or commission services to meet their needs.
Most of the money that we receive for Education partnerships has to be directly provided to schools and we have no control over the amount we receive and the amount that is provided to schools as this is set nationally. Other funding where there is more flexibility is the work we do to assess the needs of children with special educational needs and disabilities and provide support. We also have responsibilities to prevent children from being excluded from school and providing education for them if they have been excluded from school.
Finally, a small team of staff oversee the school admissions process for primary and secondary schools in the city, managing the requests for and parental choice of school place for their children.
The budget for this area covers bin collections and disposal costs, recycling and garden waste collections and the provision of household recycling centres.
We have set up our own company to carry out these services, North Somerset Environment Company (NSEC) who have already worked hard to transform services and provide them at the best value but we all recognise that there are more things that we can do together.
We currently recycle or compost around 60% of the household waste – or 56,000 tonnes although this has remained fairly static in recent years. We would like, with your help, to reach our ambitious target of 70% of waste recycled by 2030, because we will not only save money by not paying landfill charges, we will help achieve our climate change targets.
Following an extensive public consultation earlier this year, councillors have agreed to introduce three weekly black bin waste collections in 2025. Changing the waste collection frequency from fortnightly to every three weeks for most households will:
The highways network assets are the most used and most valuable items managed by councils across the country and North Somerset is no exception. We are responsible for managing Major roads, principal 'A' roads as well as minor roads that are classified as 'B', 'C' or 'U'. This covers 697 miles of carriageway, 580 miles of footway and over 40 cycleways and over 22,000 signposts and 21,000 lamp columns.
The main services charged to the annual revenue budget include the following;
Parking services are also included within this area of the budget and income generated from charges are reinvested into funding the cost of car park assets as well as maintaining the highways network. Parking income cannot be used to support other council services.
The council currently spends over £10m providing Home to School Transport services to children and young people who live in North Somerset and means that the team commission a network of more than 150 routes to enable to over 3,000 children to access educational facilities each day. The service also provides a transport solution to over 200 fare-paying pupils.
"Councils do have a responsibility to provide services to those who meet certain eligibility criteria, for example children who;
Not all home to school transport services are statutory, for example transport is only available if your child attend the nearest suitable school, and transport for those attending post 16 education.
The Council is the also the Transport Authority for North Somerset and works with bus providers through its Bus Service Improvement Programme to improve the access, quality and reach of the bus network . This includes administering the concessionary fares programme and providing some directly supported bus services.
North Somerset Council has a legal duty to provide a ‘comprehensive and efficient’ library service for all those who ‘live, work or study’ in the district. This means delivering a service that is accessible to all residents using reasonable means, making best use of the assets available whilst recognising the constraints on council resources. There is also an expectation that libraries nationally will deliver on four ‘Universal Library Offers’: reading, digital and information, culture and creativity, and health and wellbeing as these offers demonstrate the work that every public library service does to enrich the lives of individuals and their communities.
The council has developed a libraries strategy which outlines the future ambitions and responds to the changing needs of the community based on feedback provided through the latest consultation. In summary this places libraries at the heart of communities by;
But given that the demand for libraries is changing we need to keep them relevant to residents and also ensure that we make the service sustainable in the future and in doing this we recognise that we will need to be creative and so are already focused on looking at ways in which we can deliver library services that cost less. We will also need to consider whether using our library buildings in additional ways can support this or whether alternative delivery models are appropriate to support our local needs. For example, the mobile library has been successful in supporting the needs of residents who live in more rural locations.
Our natural environment and the North Somerset landscape, which includes green spaces, wildlife and waterways, is important to us all. We all depend on the benefits provided by nature, also known as ecosystem services and these include things like clean water and air, flood prevention and recreation.
The climate and nature emergency has shown that our environment can be very fragile and needs careful management to flourish and to address this we have prepared a green infrastructure strategy to help us protect and enhance our natural environment. This covers our parks and open spaces, woodlands, seaside walks and coastal pathway and natural flood defences.
This service also include leisure services and the council offers affordable and accessible facilities for sport and exercise through its leisure centres and swimming pools.
The North Somerset Local Plan identifies where development can and cannot take place in North Somerset. It guides investment for new housing, jobs, transport and community facilities over the next 15 years. Our planning and building control services support implementation of the Local Plan, whislt placemkaing strategies support the development of our towns.
Our Economic Plan sets out or vision for how we will support ecpnomic growth across North Somerset by working with businesses and communities.
Our enabling functions are the behind-the-scenes administration tasks that are usually invisible to the public. Some of these are legally required such as a democratic function, finance, legal and HR. Others are discretionary but contribute to the good governance of the organisation or are neccesary for the organisation to function well such as IT services or customer services.
The council provides a range of online and digital based services so that the people of North Somerset have ways to connect with the council 24 hours a day. A contact centre is also available for those who require alternative service provision.
The council also provides services to the residents of North Somerset in a variety of ways and at a range of locations. Some of these services are provided online, over the phone or at home although many others can be accessed through our buildings. We have buildings across the district that can be used as; schools, nurseries, childrens centres and family hubs, leisure centres and swimming pools, libraries, community halls, depots and offices.
These are legal responsibilities of the council.
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The Government requires all councils to provide a local council tax support scheme to help people pay their council tax bill if they are on a low income or claiming certain benefits.
Each council has created their own council tax support (CTS) scheme and so the amount of support will vary depending on where you live and a range of factors including your age, your income, your savings, who you live with and how much council tax you are required to pay.
In North Somerset, if you are of working age, council tax support is a capped at 75.5% which would mean that a resident is required to pay 24.5% of their council tax bill. For example, if your annual council tax bill is £1,000, you could get up to £755 of council tax support and would be required to pay £245 contribution towards the cost of delivering services.
The CTS scheme provides 100% protection to 4,930 pensioners who are on low incomes and supports 6,830 working age residents.
In 2024/25 the cost of support is expected to be £13m as this is a reduction in the amount of council tax income that we could expect to receive.
When looking at ways to balance the budget, council tax support is something that should be considered alongside the costs we currently pay to deliver services.
Responsible for collecting council tax and business rates, recovering debts and administering the council tax support scheme. The service also administers welfare and household support schemes for those on low incomes giving to help people with food, fuel, clothing and furniture. And also oversees discretionary housing payments to people affected by welfare reform and hardship.
The Council is able to increase income by raising levels of council tax each year and this is important because it is our major way of funding the delivery of our services. If you would like to change the level of income the Council raises through council tax as part of balancing your budget, please use the slider to tell us how much you would like council tax to change in 2025-26.
Based on current guidance from Central Government as at October 2024, if the Council increases council tax (excluding any increases relating to the adult social care precept) by over 3% in a year we would need to carry out a referendum, where all residents over 18 will be asked to vote on whether they accept the proposed increase or not. It is believed that the one-off cost of this referendum would be approximately £x.
The council is able to raise additional income across a number of areas such as car parks, garden waste, sport and leisure, environmental waste, highways and concessions. As with council tax, our budget modelling already assumes a general increase in line with inflation.
We have grouped the income from these services together, recognising that changes made here in the simulator will be averages as some fees are set naitonally.