YOUNGSTERS who need support could benefit from a new children’s home if Southend Council’s new social care plan is agreed.

The council recently revealed a projected £8.1million budget overspend with adult and children’s social care costs the main burden.

Proposals for a new care home would reduce the financial hit with the average residential social placement costing £335,000 per annum per child and a figure that has been steadily increasing since 2016/17.

The average price of a residential care placement is also now 67 per cent higher than it was in 2021/22 and has further increased by 18 per cent from 2023/24.

Speaking at a policy and resources meeting Laurie Burton, councillor responsible for children, young people and special educational needs, said previous efforts to recruit local foster carers had proved a success and attention was now being turned to providing a council care service.

He said: “We’re working on plans for a children’s home locally. We’re looking for a provider. It won’t be for the very high needs but it will help. The really expensive places that cause the big burden, they’re not going to be in-house. But as with the young people in foster care, a few years ago, a rather high proportion of those were not cared for directly by the local authority but by independent fostering agencies and that incurred extra costs because you are paying an agency and not paying foster carers directly.

“We had the foster carer offer which increased the fees paid to foster carers so we’re quite pleased we’re recruiting foster carers and actually had some people moving from the independent sector to be employed by us which is good for young people because if they are directly employed they are more likely to be close to home. We want to keep young people looked after by us a close as possible.”

Mr Burton said while the council couldn’t provide the speciality care to very high needs children it could cut costs in other areas. This includes making sure the NHS pays “their fair share” where appropriate and making sure home to school transport is provided where most appropriate.

He said: “The primary reason for the overspend in this area is the statutory spend on the very high needs expensive placements. The vast majority of organisations are privately run and they know demand exceeds supply so they’re putting prices up and up each year.

“We’re not taking it on the chin.”