Liverpool City Council's budget 2024-2025

In 2023/24, Liverpool City Council set a three-year budget, to enable us to take a longer-term and more strategic view when making decisions. The financial year 2024/25 is therefore the second year of this budget.

It outlined savings of £85 million between 2023 and 2026, with £49 million to be found in the first year, and £21 million in the second, with the remaining decisions to be implemented in the next year.

Over the last two years, we have been progressing our Financial Improvement Plan, which has included establishing a new mechanism for financial management, making sure we live within our means. These include actions on debt write-off, improved income collection, capital programme development and a new reserves policy.

There is no doubt that this remains a challenging time for Local Government, due to the volatility of the economy and inflation. There has also been a large increase in homelessness nationally, reflected locally in Liverpool, which is putting pressure on our in-year budget, as well as high levels of demand for social care. We are working extremely hard to manage this situation and mitigate the impact. Due to careful and detailed planning, we were able to set a balanced budget for 2024/25.

We are committed to delivering on our recently refreshed four-year Council Plan, which outlines how we will make the city fairer, cleaner and stronger for all. Our budget will include investment in improving the delivery and effectiveness of services in our communities by rolling out a new Neighbourhood Model which will see neighbourhood managers in 13 areas of the city, complemented by additional investment in street cleansing.

The budget included a recommendation to increase in Council Tax. We have had to raise this by the maximum allowed - 2.99 per cent in Council Tax, plus a further 2 per cent to help meet adult social care costs (4.99 per cent in total), as a contribution towards the overall cost of services.

The Government does assume councils will increase bills annually when it allocates the Local Government Finance Settlement. If there is no increase, that could lead to a reduction in essential services, which could particularly impact our most vulnerable residents.

How to comment

You can email any comments to budget@liverpool.gov.uk.