East Sussex County Council agrees budget with £70m borrowing bid

On Tuesday (February 10), East Sussex County Council agreed its budget for the 2026/27 financial year, which included a 4.99 per cent council tax increase and new in-year savings totalling more than £3.5m.

Despite this, the budget still includes a £55.5m shortfall, which the council is unable to fund from its own reserves. In light of this, the council is seeking Exceptional Financial Support (EFS) from the government — a request to borrow as much as £70m to plug its funding gap.

Cllr Nick Bennett, council lead member for resources and climate change, said: “The review of local government finances, the Fair Funding Review, the business rates reset and local government settlement has failed to recognise the various pressures this county faces in meeting the needs of its residents.

“The council has a firm foundation of governance; sound and prudent financial management. This has been endorsed through CIPFA, recent Ofsted [and] CQC service inspections and the Grant Thornton value for money report that we published recently.

“We are seeking Exceptional Financial Support and we are not alone in this. This will ensure the valued services of this authority continue to be delivered.

“The report confirms the lobbying endeavours that will be critical over the coming year and the work we’ve done raise issues, including on [how] social care provision has not been met with sufficient income from the latest funding reforms.

“We must now move on to an outlook of inadequate resources over the coming years.”

Warnings about the council’s finances were shared by Liberal Democrat group leader David Tutt.

He said: “I think we need to recognise, as a body, that we are in a serious financial state.”

Cllr Tutt said his group felt proposals it had made in previous years — specifically mentioning the sale of County Hall and introduction of on-street parking enforcement in Wealden — would have seen the council in stronger position than it currently is. But he also said there were no in-year savings currently available.

The Lib Dems opted to abstain from voting on the budget, highlighting concerns around the level of debt being taken on.

Other opposition groups also opted to abstain while simultaneously not tabling any alternative budget proposals.

After the meeting, Labour group deputy leader Christine Robinson was asked if there were a possibility of the government not allowing the county council access to EFS. Cllr Robinson said: “I will do everything I can — and I will speak to my MP — to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

Green Party leader Johnny Denis said: “Effectively, it is not our budget. It is a budget of necessity. It is a terrible place to be. No local authority should be in this place and yet it is the accumulation of over a decade of active defunding of local government.”

Conservative council leader Keith Glazier said: “We have been warning. The evidence is still there from my letters of the last five years, that I have written — on an annual basis to government — telling them that they are not [providing] the amount of funding to provide the services that they expect of us, statutorily, year-on-year; so we have been using our budget and reserves to prop that up.” The council is due to find savings of £6.3m during the 2026/27 financial year.

These include proposals to stop paying term-time accommodation for care leavers who become university students.

Other measures include plans to review the council’s climate change activities and resources to find savings of around £65,000.

The council intends to save £275,000 by ‘reviewing and optimising’ its winter gritting routes.

Other savings will come from staffing reductions in the council’s policy and communications teams.