Councils set aside £20m for reorganisation

Worcestershire's councils are setting aside £20m to pay for an upcoming reorganisation of local government in the county.

The area's existing county council and six district councils are due be scrapped in 2028 and replaced by either one or two unitary authorities.

An announcement on whether Worcestershire will be covered by one new council or two is expected later this month.

The government said its plan to reorganise local government would save costs and reduce duplication of services in the long run, but could cost millions of pounds in its initial stages.

Of the £20m, Worcestershire County Council is contributing £10m and the districts – Worcester, Malvern Hills, Wychavon, Bromsgrove, Redditch and Wyre Forest – will provide about £1.66m each.

Although some money has been set aside centrally to set up the new unitary councils there is a concern this will not be enough.

"All councils across Worcestershire are working very closely together to prepare for Local Government Reorganisation (LGR)," a joint statement on behalf of the seven authorities said.

"We will not know the full extent of implementation costs until the decision is made, which is still expected to be mid-July.

"As a partnership, we have agreed that the cost of LGR implementation would be funded 50% by the county council, with the remainder shared equally across the six district councils.

"At this point, we do not know whether there will be one or two unitary councils across Worcestershire."

The statement added that the government had announced a £63m transition fund nationally to support LGR, with a guaranteed minimum of £900,000 allocated to each new unitary authority.

"These implementation grants are intended to assist with transition costs, effective service setup, and governance arrangements.

"This will contribute to the cost of running of the county-wide elections in 2027 for the shadow authority/authorities, the extensive set up work needed to ensure readiness for the takeover of all services in April 2028, and various third-party costs such as software licences."

The statement continued: "However, the government's grant will not be sufficient under either model.

"Therefore, during budget setting for the existing Worcestershire councils, funding will need to be identified in advance of the ongoing savings that are expected to be delivered as a result of LGR by 2029-30."

This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service which covers councils and other public service organisations.

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