Richmond Council has approved an £18 million allocation from reserves to its Transformation Programme Delivery Fund, a move designed to address a significant financial challenge. The council is facing core funding cuts of £29 million annually over the next three years.
The Transformation Programme aims to deliver £39 million in annual savings by its fourth year, with a projected savings profile indicating £7.54m in 2026/27, £20.89m in 2027/28, £32.79m in 2028/29, £38.53m in 2029/30, and £39.23m in 2030/31. The programme's strategy centres on prevention, early intervention, leveraging technology, streamlining processes, and optimising assets.
Councillor Jim Millard, Deputy Leader and Finance and Resources Lead Member, stated that the programme's objective is to deliver quality services within a sustainable budgetary framework.
He added that the programme is also about protecting the services that matter most to our residents and ensuring that the services that we provide to those residents promote independence and ensure that we maintain the high outcomes that we already deliver across some of our demand-led services.
James Wills-Fleming, Director of Transformation, further elaborated that the programme aims to deliver significant savings while improving outcomes, delivering the changes that are needed to enable us to reshape the organisation to deliver quality services within a sustainable budgetary framework.
Specific preventative and early intervention strategies are being embedded across council services. Within Adult Social Care & Public Health, the Empower, Reduce, Delay
business case focuses on a proactive, preventative approach to empower residents to live longer, healthy, and fulfilling lives, thereby preventing, reducing, and delaying the need for care and support. This includes a place-based prevention model delivering early strengths-based support through integrated community and public health pathways, using data insights to reduce demand and improve wellbeing. It also involves strengthening early help and Occupational Therapy pathways to deliver person-centred interventions that maximise independence and reduce flow into long-term care.
For Children's Services, the Families First Reform
programme aims to make support earlier, clearer, and more family-focused. The SEND Reform
programme will shift the SEND system towards early intervention and mainstream inclusion. The Early Intervention & Prevention
workstream also prioritises supporting the forecasting of future demand through improved demand modelling and developing targeted early intervention identification capabilities using predictive analytics.
During a Finance, Policy and Resources Committee meeting on September 24, 2026, councillors approved the programme's structure and scope. While concerns were raised regarding the magnitude of the financial challenge and the timeline for achieving savings, assurances were provided that these savings are contingent upon both immediate actions and longer-term preventative measures. The meeting documents can be found in the Agenda frontsheet and the Public reports pack.
