Our budget 2025/26 video
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Transcript
As we set the Council’s budget for another year, I want to explain how it is spent and how that reflects the priorities that we have for our city.
Since 2010 we’ve talked a lot about the financial pressures facing councils like ours and how we’ve been navigating them. The devastating impact of austerity, which slashed hundreds of millions from our budget, can’t be fixed overnight. Today, though, I want to shine the spotlight on the significant spending power we still have - and how we are using it to make lives better and improve our city, investing in what local residents tell us matter most to them.
You have told us time and time again that you want us to prioritise support for the most vulnerable in our city and that’s what we’re doing.
We are helping around 5,500 children who need assistance, support and protection. This included 1,351 Looked After Children in the direct care of the Council, 842 of them in foster care.
We are supporting more than 3,500 vulnerable adults through either care at home or residential care placements – from older people to younger adults with learning disabilities or other physical and mental health needs.
And we providing equipment and home adaptations to help thousands more people live independently.
We are supporting around 2,500 homeless households and preventing others becoming homeless in the first place.
At the same time, we aren’t losing sight of the services that everyone relies on, those that keep the city running and make Manchester a great place to live.
For example:
Emptying your bins, a staggering 31 million collections every single year,
Maintaining and investing in almost 150 parks and green spaces across the city,
And running our much loved 23 libraries and 25 leisure centres,
And of course maintaining almost 2,500 miles of roads and pavements.
It’s a huge range of services that we deliver but they’re all working together for Manchester.
And as well as these day-to-day responsibilities, we’re investing in the future too to make our city an even better place to live.
We are bringing forward plans to enhance neighbourhoods and improve public spaces across the city, for example here in Wythenshawe where the Civic Centre will be transformed in the coming years.
We’re committed to making sure that we are helping Manchester residents thrive and we are continuing to lend a helping hand to Mancunians who are struggling to get by.
Last year alone we spent £42m on measures to tackle poverty and hardship and support Mancunians with the cost of living.
Such as our Winter Hardship Fund that's already helped over 7,500 people over the age of 65 with payments of £150 to £200 or support for carers, for care leavers, for people with learning disabilities and physical disabilities and of course helping over 46,000 children have access to free school meals for the holidays.
As well as supporting those who need it most, that means building the homes that we need. That’s why we are building more affordable homes, council homes, social homes than at any point in the last 15 years.
High quality, low cost, low carbon homes, such as these council houses here in Collyhurst.
The last year alone 600 were completed with 1,500 more on site and another 1,450 with planning permission ready to go.
And we know it’s the everyday stuff that often matters most and we are determined to make our city an even better place to live – from tidy streets to thriving district centres.
That’s why in this budget and in future years we’ll be investing millions more in the services that keep neighbourhoods clean and green. Specifically investing an extra £5 million to tackle fly-tipping, to clear leaves and to clean our streets.
Our revenue budget for 2025 and 2026 is £894 million. We want to make sure that every pound we spend benefits Manchester people. Here’s how that spending breaks down.
The largest part of our budget goes on caring for and supporting older people, children and those with learning disabilities, as well as public health.
It also goes on helping to prevent homelessness and helping to provide accommodation and other support for those experiencing it.
Pie chart graphic shows:
Adult Social Care £278m - 31%
Children and Education Services £174m - 19%
Public Health - £49m - 6%
Homelessness £32m - 4%
A significant slice is devoted to providing a wide range of services in your neighbourhoods – from emptying your bins to looking after your libraries, leisure centres, roads and parks.
Pie chart graphic shows:
Neighbourhood Services: £113m - 13%
Another element is corporate budgets which help fund transport, investment in building projects and providing contingency funding to help us plan for inflation and other, unexpected, costs.
Pie chart graphic shows:
Corporate budgets £148m - 17%
Then there’s funding for what we call the Core - the behind-the-scenes services at the heart of the Council which keep it going, and enable our staff to work hard for the city.
Pie chart graphic shows:
Core: £115m - 13%
Finally, there’s Growth and Development – overseeing the building of much-needed housing, attracting jobs and investment to the city and helping ensure Manchester people have the skills to share in that success.
The Growth and Development directorate, which rents out buildings owned by the Council commercially, brings in more money than it costs so it actually helps reduce overall spending.
Pie chart graphic shows:
Growth and Development: -15m
In common with councils across the country, our finances remain under pressure. The impact of funding cuts since 2010 – both on the Council and the people we serve – is ongoing. So too are challenges around the cost of social care.
But improved funding under the new Government and the efficiency savings we have been able to make while protecting services mean we can deliver a balanced budget for this year. A budget that works for Manchester.