Flintshire County Council has forecast a £38.4m shortfall in the money it needs to spend in 2025/26.
Under the Local Government Finance Act 1988 it is illegal for any council in the UK to go into a new financial year without setting a budget that has balanced the money it receives with the money it needs to spend.
For well over a decade all councils in the UK have faced considerable financial challenges because of year on year underfunding from national governments.
Over this time Flintshire has cut it's spending by more than £125m.
68% of the funding Flintshire receives comes from Welsh Government and per head of population we are ranked 20 out of 22 councils in Wales for the money we receive to deliver services.
Every year it gets harder and we share our concerns that the gap between the money we are given and what we need to spend may be too big, but with a lot of hard work and some difficult decisions we just about manage to do it.
Over this time we've exhausted all the easy options to cut spending and we've also exhausted the moderate to difficult options. Without any additional funding from Welsh Government we are at a serious, critical stage where we are left with only hard choices that will significantly impact our residents and workforce.
Although we are working hard to identify solutions, it's no exaggeration when we say that 2025/26 may be year when we can't close the gap.
Why is 2025/26 so different to other years?
Welsh Government will announce its budget in December and without a significant increase in our funding we will be facing a major and serious challenge.
Each 1% of extra funding we receive from Welsh Government is worth £2.585m.
To shrink our gap by 50% (£19.202m) we would need a 7.4% increase from Welsh Government.
Independent analysis of Welsh Government’s budget is telling us that at best we may only get 1% or less. We also can’t rule out a 0% increase, so until we know more we must plan for this possibility.
To balance past budgets, Flintshire has already done much of what other councils across the UK are currently considering to cut spending. We have very few options left to cut more spending without our residents and workforce feeling the impact.
Considerations are now at a critical stage and Councillors would like to hear your views and opinions.
More information about our budget challenges can be found on our website (opens in new window).
To see how we will handle the information you give us go to our website (opens in new window).