Our budget for the next financial year has been agreed and here’s a video that explains some of the biggest financial challenges we face.

Our corporate director for resources, Gary Fielding, outlines why our taxpayers are facing an increase in their bills as well as some of the most significant pressures that are faced in North Yorkshire.

The budget for the next financial year will mean we can continue to deliver key services for you from waste collection and recycling to special educational needs provision and highways maintenance to housing.

The government has changed the way that councils are being funded around the country, with more money being given to areas with high deprivation.

However, this has meant that councils covering large rural areas such as North Yorkshire have been hit particularly hard in the new financial settlements, which now span three years instead of the previous agreements that were for just 12 months.

The changes have meant that we have lost almost £20 million in our core funding just 12 months after being handed one of the worst financial settlements in the country.

We are already battling a financial shortfall of more than £20 million in the current financial year.

We have lost £14.3 million in a grant to services in a rural area and a further £19.7 million as part of the new funding settlement, totalling £34 million.

However, the financial challenges could have been even greater without the creation of North Yorkshire Council – and the fact that we are offering some of the best value for taxpayers nationally. 

Independent research has placed the delivery of our services in the county as among the best performing nationally. 

The analysis has ranked us as the third most productive council in the country in the IMPOWER Index. 

The council is the best performing in the North of England and the announcement is being heralded as support for the move to create a single organisation in the county when the previous eight authorities merged from April 1, 2023.

The index has been compiled by researchers at IMPOWER, a consultancy firm which was launched in 2000 to provide an insight into how effective the public sector is performing.

The analysis measures productivity based on outcomes achieved per pound spent across seven major service areas that typically account for 70 per cent of spending in local government. These services include children’s social care, special educational needs and disabilities, housing, homelessness and waste and recycling along with social care for older adults as well as working age adults.

IMPOWER’S top 10 rankings highlight authorities that outperform their closest statistical neighbours by the largest margins across the most service areas which were analysed.

North Yorkshire Council launched on 1 April 2023, when the previous seven district and borough authorities and the county council came together to form one organisation.

The biggest shake-up in local government in nearly 50 years was a key requirement for a devolution deal for York and North Yorkshire, which has brought more decision-making powers to a local level as well as millions of pounds of extra funding from the government.

Following the launch of North Yorkshire Council in April 2023, a plan has been drawn up to achieve more than £130 million in savings, of which £68 million would not have been achievable without local government reorganisation.

However, this has still left a predicted £25 million annual deficit by 31 March 2029.