CHANGES to national insurance and the minimum wage will put more financial pressure on cash-strapped Cheshire East as care providers will have to charge the council more, councillors said.

Both Labour and Conservative councillors agreed the recent changes announced in the budget by chancellor Rachel Reeves would increase the cost for care packages.

The comments were made at today’s (Thursday)  meeting of the finance sub-committee as councillors were discussing what progress had been made on savings, particularly in adult services which is facing a £20m overspend.

Cllr Stewart GardinerCllr Stewart Gardiner (Image: Cheshire East Council) Cllr Stewart Gardiner (Con) said the providers of adult care services in the past had said they couldn’t provide required care for the price the council was paying ‘and that is before we look at the recent changes to national insurance, which, at the moment, the government is not looking to exempt care homes from, so those care providers will have to find that money somewhere’.

He added: “They will not continue operating if we cannot up what we give them.

“So therefore, we are asking to reduce an overspend at the same time when there's going to be increased demand [because of winter] and the potential for increased charges, and if we do not pick up and deal with that in a radical way, we will be in the third quarter [of the financial year]  looking at an increased deficit rather than a decline.”

Cllr Jill RhodesCllr Jill Rhodes (Image: Cheshire East Council) Cllr Jill Rhodes (Crewe, Lab), chair of adults and health, said a lot of the council debt is around adult social care and people delaying fees against their property.

She said the council was looking at debt and what it can collect, ‘and making sure that we can collect those debts and take that burden from the council's borrowing’.

She added: “I'm just hoping that in quarter three we can see a bit of reduction in that forecast, but I don't think the recent changes to minimum wage and national insurance have assisted the adults department in actually reducing that overspend, because it has put additional pressure on what the providers will be asking of the council for those care packages.”