The amount of money available for disability adaptations to council homes in Stevenage is set to be slashed.

At a meeting of Stevenage Borough Council’s cabinet on Wednesday  (November 13), Cllr Jeannette Thomas revealed that the authority’s current financial strategy would lead to a £21m funding shortfall in its Housing Revenue Account (HRA) across the years up to and including 2028/29.

It comes amid rising costs, with the causes including a “significant increase” in the number of roofing and fencing repairs being carried out, the implementation of new regulations, and a plan to speed up work on empty properties.

Rents for future years are also expected to be lower than previously envisaged, with inflation running at 1.7 per cent instead of the predicted 3.5 per cent. The assumed rent increase for 2025/26 is 2.7 per cent.

The council is looking to make cuts to balance its Housing Revenue Account—a ringfenced account covering income and expenditure from council homes that is legally required not to be in deficit. 

These include reducing the budget for disability aids and adaptations from £1.05m per year to £550,000 per year.

In a report prepared for cabinet members, council officers said the current budget for adaptations is being “fully utilised” but pointed to other options, such as moving tenants to “more suitable homes”.

Stevenage Borough Council’s spending on disability adaptations has rocketed in recent years, rising to the current level of £1.05m from £421,000 in 2017/18.

The council is also hoping to find £7m from cutting its decarbonisation programme.

It had planned to bring 2,600 council homes with an Energy Performance Certificate below a C rating up to scratch but, with the council estimating it would have to spend £9,000 per property, the scheme is set to be significantly reduced.

Under the revised plans, around 500 to 550 homes would be able to bid for funding rather than the full number previously stated.

Cllr Thomas, cabinet member for resources and transformation, said: “In order to balance the budget for 2025/26, the council must make some difficult decisions and is proposing that the decarbonisation capital projects are revised from £20m to £13m over the medium term, which continues the important work to improve and insulate homes while ensuring our financial stability.”

However, the council still intends to spend significant amounts of money on social housing.

Cllr Jackie Hollywell, cabinet member for housing, noted that the plan up to 2028/29 is to spend £132m on improving existing council homes and £114m on building new ones.

On the planned decarbonisation cuts, Cllr Simon Speller, cabinet member for environment, said he would “like to make a big challenge” to Kevin Bonavia, MP for Stevenage, Cllr Richard Henry, council leader, and the government, to “follow up what Keir Starmer said for COP 29 … about supporting our green economy”.

He called on the government to “enable us, with our feeble funds compared to their funds, to deliver on our full decarbonisation programme and to not waver from our target of achieving net zero for Stevenage Borough Council assets, processes and activities by 2030”.

He was supported by Cllr Hollywell, who said decarbonising homes through improved EPC ratings would also “tackle fuel poverty among our tenants” and added she would “happily lobby our MP and ministers” about the issue.

In response, Mr Bonavia said “decarbonisation to create cleaner air and combat climate change is vital work” and told the Local Democracy Reporting Service he would be happy to meet cabinet members to discuss how he can support them.

He added that £1.3bn in additional council funding announced in the recent budget showed the chancellor is beginning to “turn the corner for local government”, which he said had “borne the brunt of 14 years of austerity, leading to difficult decisions on local budgets and service provision”.

Cllr Henry said the council had been put “in a really difficult position” by “the last 14 years or so of constant cuts”.