Looking back on 2024, and ahead to 2025

Here is the New Year message that I’ve written (and put out on KCC’s media hub) as we head towards 2025. It’s a bit longer than usual - but then both looking back and looking forward, there’s quite a lot to say …

As we reach the end of 2024, we have a lot of achievements to look back on – and both plans and challenges for 2025.

Just before Christmas the Government’s White Paper on devolution set out a vision for the future for local government, one that now starts us on a path of the most important and potentially transformational journeys that KCC has seen for many years. It is clear that changes will happen, and on the government’s timetable – not ours. Early in 2025 government will set out which areas belong to the priority devolution programme. It is certainly open to Kent and Medway to be part of that, and we will continue our conversations with officials and ministers.

I know that the prospect of change can be unsettling. At this very early stage it is not possible to say exactly what the changes will involve or how we may all be affected. We can however be sure that any future arrangements will have to build on our record of effective delivery, and the vital services that we provide will be needed as much or more than ever under any new arrangements.

2024 saw some remarkable work and achievements across the council. A visit from Ofsted confirmed the strength of our children’s services, rated Outstanding in 2022. We are now delivering our programme of Family Hubs; I was able to see some of this exceptional work on a visit to a family hub in Maidstone with Sue Chandler (Cabinet Member for Integrated Children’s Services) and other colleagues. In SEND, we saw the lifting of the Improvement Notice imposed in 2023 and the continued delivery of our programme of change that is now yielding results.

Responding to the court judgments of 2023, we have built out five new reception centres for all Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking (UAS) Children arriving in Kent. On 14 November, we welcomed government ministers Dame Angela Eagle and Janet Daby to two of our Reception Centres to see first-hand the great work our staff are doing to safeguard the welfare of UAS Children and the very real challenges we continue to face in doing so.

This work has enabled us to cope with unprecedented levels of arrivals (2,728 referrals up to 20 December), while our willingness to challenge governments of whatever complexion has meant that we have shielded the Kent council taxpayer from the financial impact of this and have ensured much faster transfers (2,316 this year) of UAS Children to other Local Authorities via the National Transfer Scheme (NTS). We continue, however, to press for further changes to ensure that the system works efficiently and effectively in the future. Kent and its services must not shoulder an excessive responsibility for what is a national, and international issue.

We have deepened our collaboration between social care, public health and the NHS through the delivery plan for the Integrated Care Strategy and are developing innovative work to manage winter pressures.

We spent much of the year preparing for the introduction of the EU’s new external frontier, the Entry Exit System (EES). It was delayed just weeks before its scheduled introduction in November but our teams, working with local and national partners, had carried out detailed preparations to mitigate the potential impact on the county. This work will serve us well if, as seems likely, we see a more gradual move to the new system in 2025. Meanwhile, this summer saw a largely successful management of traffic pressures around the ports.

In spite of the continuing inadequacies of national funding for road repairs, our highways teams oversaw a major pothole blitz and are our front line in responding to severe weather and winter pressures. Our public transport team has delivered vital support for local bus services while bringing forward further development of Fastrack services at either end of the county.

I was delighted to attend the opening of a state-of-the-art Waste Transfer Station in Sevenoaks in the autumn, while our environment teams are bringing forward both the detail of Making Space for Nature and longer-term plans for environment and adaptation in our county. We have continued to press for the restoration of international train services at Ashford and Ebbsfleet, and for new nuclear at Dungeness, while also working to support the development of Discovery Park, where in August I was delighted to join the Park’s owners in welcoming Asymchem, who are establishing their European development and pilot manufacturing site there.

In July the council unanimously agreed to develop work on a Memorandum of Understanding with the Chernihiv region in Ukraine. At the invitation of the regional administration, I and colleague Cllr Jordan Meade Mead travelled there at the end of October. The short trip, at our own expense, was an opportunity to sign the agreement in person and discuss areas of further learning and cooperation. It was an unforgettable few days and there is a powerful bond between our communities.

On the Government’s decision to remove the Winter Fuel Allowance, we launched a very strong campaign with our district and borough colleagues to promote the take up of Pension Credit, which unlocks that benefit and a number of others. We then went a step further with a slice of the latest round of Household Support Fund from the Department for Work and Pensions; our Just Missing Out scheme is there for those of pension age just over the threshold who are by no means hugely affluent and will therefore be impacted by the changes.

This work is linked to our innovative and impactful Financial Hardship Programme which seeks to not only support but also build resilience in some of our most vulnerable residents. It’s an area I am proud we as a council have taken forward, utilising very specific funding opportunities in the most effective way.

Under our Securing Kent’s Future programme, we have made a lot of progress in reducing the areas of financial pressure that were so severe in 2022 and 2023. However, in common with much of local government, significant stresses and strains on our budget remain and the support we receive from central government has not kept pace with the increased pressures. We also need to see fundamental reform in the areas that generate our budget pressures: adult social care, children’s social services (in particular, placement costs) and special educational needs and disabilities. These issues of budget pressures and reform, along with devolution, will be the major themes of 2025.

My final word must be for the staff of Kent County Council who, with a quiet diligence and commitment while facing many challenges, seek to do the very best for the people of Kent day in and out. I owe them my gratitude and deeply held respect.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone in Kent a very Happy New Year.

Looking ahead to 2024

Well, that’s almost it for 2023. 

It was another tough year. Tougher than the year before. Which is awkward, because that is what I said at the end of 2022. 

So, in issuing a New Year message, it’s hard to avoid a sense of Groundhog Day. My wonderful colleague, the late John Simmonds (KCC Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Finance) used to like to quote Enver Hoxha, the Communist dictator of Albania: ‘This year will be harder than last year. However it will be easier than next year.’ Perhaps an unusual source for a Conservative county councillor, but John wasn’t wrong - and it has felt especially apposite in the last couple of years. 

This reflects, above all, the financial pressures that we have experienced, as have councils up and down the country. Not that this is the only issue we face; since the summer, a series of court judgments (including our successful Judicial Review of the Home Secretary) have highlighted the impact of asylum, and in particular our responsibilities for Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children. But the financial issue is the most pressing. 

In the last couple of years, this has not reflected cuts in government support; settlements have been quite generous by historic standards (whether they have been adequate is another matter). Nor do they reflect, in the short run at least, the familiar pressures of demography. Instead, they reflect massive increases in costs as a result both of general inflation and of broken markets in adult social care, children’s services placements and transport (though home to school transport, in particular for children with special educational needs, is also seeing big increases in numbers in step with the rise in Education, Health and Care Plans).

I am pleased that, faced from the summer with evidence of severe financial pressures, we have developed a comprehensive and coherent response, seen in our Cabinet papers of 17 August and especially 5 October, which launched our programme Securing Kent’s Future. We will see a further stage of that work as we present our budget in the New Year, but that is not the end of the process; our financial position will not change fundamentally and so we will need to develop further our multi-year approach to ensuring our financial viability. 

However, as I have emphasised in my New Year message, we have to be concerned with more than just survival. Last year, I suggested two areas through which we could look beyond the immediate financial challenge. The first was our work with the NHS. Here we can report progress. A revised and enhanced Integrated Care Strategy is due for approval by our Cabinet on Friday (4 January). It reflects much wider engagement than was possible with the first iteration of the strategy (which under national requirements had to be put together to a rapid deadline of 31 December 2022). From here we can develop detailed action plans that can deliver the strategy’s aims. This is the best, most systematic approach to collaboration between the NHS and local government so far, and offers a real prospect of much shared better management of our resources and services.

The second area was that of devolution, and this has been much harder to deliver. The approach of the end of this Parliament has made councils less willing to commit to new arrangements than might otherwise have been the case; as a result, while we submitted an Expression of Interest to government in the summer, it was clear that there was not support for the more radical options of a Combined County Authority (including a mayor). This added to the challenges of the summer. 

Nonetheless, it is important that we continue to develop a vision of what devolution can mean for Kent and Medway; it is only by this that we can address the key issues for the county in skills, infrastructure, economic development and transport. The exact form this will take remains unclear but both major parties remain committed to the concept of devolution and we must pursue this. 

Finally, amid the challenges, we still carry out vital roles in shaping and supporting life in the County and the interests of our residents: whether in environmental protection and enhancement, support for our vulnerable residents through the economic crisis of recent years, delivery of vital (and high quality) services to vulnerable children and adults,  work with our voluntary and community sector and much more. All this we will continue and redouble in 2024.

I wish all Kent residents a very happy New Year.