Children's Services budget and staffing
Case reference FOI2026/00091
Received 14 January 2026
Published 29 January 2026
Request
I am writing to you under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to request the following information. If this full request goes over the cost limit, please answer questions in numerical order until cost limit is reached. Please may you provide me with:
1. The total number of referrals to Children’s Services per year each year for the last five years
2. The total budget allocated to Children’s services (by calendar year or financial year, whichever is easier) eachyear for the last five years
3. The total cost of employing agency (temporary / non-staff) social workers per year each year for the last fiveyears
4. Total expenditure on housing children and young adults in non-local authority (ie. privately run) children’s homes per year each year for the last five years, and the average cost per child per annum for such placements in each year for the last five years
Response
I am writing to you under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to request the following information.
If this full request goes over the cost limit, please answer questions in numerical order until cost limit is reached.
Please may you provide me with:
1. The total number of referrals to Children’s Services per year each year for the last five years
A:
2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
1321 1080 2308 1569 1863 1806
2. The total budget allocated to Children’s services (by calendar year or financial year, whichever is easier) eachyear for the last five years
A: Please see below the budgeted spend for Children & Young people:
2020/21 £32.6m
2021/22 £40.2m
2022/23 £52.9m
2023/24 £51.8m
2024/25 £59.7m
3. The total cost of employing agency (temporary / non-staff) social workers per year each year for the last fiveyears
A: Please see below the total of agency spend on children’s services, filtered down to social worker roles:
2020/21 £1,636,456
2021/22 £4,208,768
2022/23 £7,475,746
2023/24 £7,782,628
2024/25 £5,633,959
4. Total expenditure on housing children and young adults in non-local authority (ie. privately run) children’s homes per year each year for the last five years, and the average cost per child per annum for such placements in each year for the last five years
A: Please see below the total spent on Residential placements for children during the years requested:
2020/21 £6,841,944
2021/22 £7,285,831
2022/23 £10,053,279
2023/24 £9,130,644
2024/25 £8,737,185
Documents
This is Herefordshire Council's response to a freedom of information (FOI) or environmental information regulations (EIR) request.
You can browse our other responses or make a new FOI request.