Devon County Council to lose £10 million in funding

Devon County Council has confirmed it will lose £10 million from its budget for the 2025/26 financial year following recent changes to Government funding.

Earlier this month, the Government announced the abolition of the Rural Services Delivery Grant, which has previously provided vital support for rural communities across the UK.

The grant is being replaced by a new Recovery Grant, which will target areas with the highest deprivation.

Devon County Council had received £10.1 million from the Rural Services Delivery Grant in the current year, with additional funding allocated to district councils and the fire service. However, the new funding settlement for the 2025/26 financial year revealed that Devon will not receive any support from the Recovery Grant.

Despite an overall increase of 2.05 per cent in the Government's grant funding for Devon, the loss of this significant £10.1 million has left the council facing tough financial decisions.

Devon County Council Leader, Mr James McInnes, expressed his disappointment at the change: “It’s a real disappointment that we won’t be getting any mitigation for the loss of this £10.1 million grant.”

He explained the immediate challenges the council now faces: “So we are facing an immediate need to make further savings in our spending to offset the loss of this grant.”

Mr McInnes added that while the council won’t set its final budget until February, the loss of this funding means additional savings will be required across various sectors: “We won’t finally set our budget for 2025/26 until next February but up to now we’d been on track to produce a balanced budget. But we are now having to examine every area of spending to make even more savings.”

The impact of the funding loss is particularly acute in rural areas like Devon, where services are more expensive to provide.

Mr McInnes highlighted several challenges, including the high cost of transporting children to school and providing social care: “We all know services cost much more to provide in rural communities because of their sparse nature.”

“Our bill for getting children to school is one of the highest in the country – particularly in the secondary sector where students can live miles away from their nearest school or college.”

He also noted that maintaining Devon's vast road network adds additional pressure on the budget: “And we have one of the biggest road networks in the country to maintain and repair.”

With the need to cut back on spending, Mr McInnes stressed that last-minute changes were inefficient and disruptive: “Responding to last minute savings like this is never an efficient, effective or economic way of spending the money we raise from council taxpayers instead of our usual prudent planning.”

As the council now prepares for the financial challenges of the year ahead, Mr McInnes and his team will continue to assess every area of spending to ensure they can deliver essential services to the people of Devon.