Social Value Ideas for Kent County Council

Highways and Transport Division Total Budget 2025-26

Total budget allocation for Highways and Transport Division is £217.4 million, comprising £78.9 million revenue budget and £138.5 million capital spend. This represents the largest service delivery ex…

“the total budget for us is 217.4 million. There is a table in the paper which is on page 27 if you'd like the details. And that comprises of 78.9 mill…”

HGV and bus funding allocated

The council reported that consolidated DfT funding has landed and will support highways maintenance, active travel and bus services. Delivery plans are being developed ahead of an October 2026 deadlin…

“Turning to funding more broadly, the good news is the consolidated DFT funding has now landed. Always a welcome moment. This will support highways mai…”

Highways Term Maintenance Contract - New Procurement

Kent County Council has received final tenders for new highways term maintenance contract covering road maintenance and resurfacing. Successful bidder to be announced in October 2025 with contract sta…

“We have received final tenders for the new highways term maintenance contract, with a successful bidder to be announced in October and the contract st…”

Adult Social Care Funding Crisis and Service Pressures

Significant financial pressures on adult social care sector nationally and at Kent level. Prevention services being squeezed across the country with spending at lowest share of adult social care budge…

“Adult social care faces some of its toughest challenges yet. As the ADES spring survey confirmed, and as Kent highlighted in our media response, preve…”

Adult Social Care Provider Sustainability Crisis

Care sector facing unprecedented pressure from April 2025 employer national insurance contributions and national living wage increases totalling 10-11% of staff cost base. Multiple providers at risk o…

“we are concerned that there will be attrition of workers seeking higher paid roles elsewhere in the local economy. And if that happens, of course, we …”

Adult Social Care Budget Overspend - Critical Financial Pressure

Adult social care is experiencing substantial ongoing overspends. Mr Collins (Cabinet Member) acknowledged this as 'the elephant in the room' and a country-wide problem. Mr Rayner raised concern about…

“adult services in particular is building up very considerable overspend on the budget, running to many millions”

South East Water AMP 8 investment plan - £1.9 billion over 5 years

South East Water plans nearly double previous investment from £1 billion to £1.9 billion in next 5-year cycle (AMP 8). Major projects include Broad Oak Reservoir (5 billion litre capacity), additional…

“in the next five years, we're planning to almost double that up to 1 .9 billion pounds. It's the biggest plan by some distance that we've ever put tog…”

Summer 2025 drought and reservoir depletion crisis

Exceptional drought conditions in spring/summer 2025 (driest spring since 1893, hottest summer on record) caused critical water resource depletion. Ardingly Reservoir dropped to 24% usable capacity (v…

“The spring this year was the driest in the region since 1893... summer was the hottest that we've seen... we were three weeks away or six weeks away f…”

Water infrastructure fragility in Whitstable and Kent coast

Summer 2025 water outages in Whitstable/Herne Bay exposed critical infrastructure weaknesses. 3,000+ properties lost supply for multiple days due to power blips, treatment works failures, and system a…

“areas in Kent where supply capacity and demand are very tight... we did see some issues this year in Whitstable, and we have seen issues in Kent over …”