Gloucestershire County Council: local authority assessment
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Assessment published: 31 January 2025
About Gloucestershire County Council
Demographics
Gloucestershire County Council is an upper-tier local authority in the South West of England. The county council cover the county of Gloucestershire and they work with six district councils across the county. The county is made up of a mix of urban and rural settings, covering Gloucester City, Cheltenham, Tewkesbury, Stroud, the Cotswolds and the Forest of Dean.
Gloucestershire County Council was ranked the 128th most deprived local authority in England out of 153 local authorities, with different levels of deprivation and population across the districts, such as higher levels of deprivation in the more built-up towns, whilst there were less populated areas with pockets of deprivation within the more rural districts.
The county has an aging population, with 22.1% of the population of Gloucestershire aged above 65, which is slightly higher than the England average of 18.61%. Across the county, 93.1% of the population identify themselves as white and 6.9% identify from non-white ethnic minorities. Overall, 12.3% of the population identifies themselves as belonging to an ethnic minority which includes white minority groups. The demographics of the districts differ across the county, with a higher concentration of people from ethnic minorities within the urban centres of Cheltenham and Gloucester.
Financial facts
The Financial facts for Gloucestershire County Council are:
- The local authority estimated that in 2023/24, its total budget would be £931,270,000. Its actual spend for that year was £970,113,000, which was £38,843,000 more than estimated.
- The local authority estimated that it would spend £202,820,000 of its total budget on adult social care in 2023/24 Its actual spend was £236,392,000, which is £33,572,000 more than estimated.
- In 2023/24, 24.37% of the budget was spent on adult social care.
- The local authority has raised the full adult social care precept for 2023/24, with a value of 2%. Please note that the amount raised through ASC precept varies from local authority to local authority.
- Approximately 6935 people were accessing long-term adult social care support, and approximately 50 people were accessing short-term adult social care support in 2022/23. Local authorities spend money on a range of adult social care services, including supporting individuals. No two care packages are the same and vary significantly in their intensity, duration, and cost.
This data is reproduced at the request of the Department of Health and Social Care. It has not been factored into our assessment and is presented for information purposes only.