Somerset Council is preparing to spend up to £7 million changing the way it supports vulnerable children and families — with the authority hoping the investment will ultimately save more than four times that amount. The five-year My World, My Tomorrow programme is aimed at getting help to families earlier, reducing the number of children entering care unnecessarily and cutting Somerset's heavy reliance on expensive residential placements.

It comes as children's services remain one of the biggest pressures on the council's finances, with demand continuing to rise while the authority is under intense pressure to balance its books. Here's what the numbers actually mean — and what Somerset is proposing to change.

Why is Somerset doing this now?

The number of children entering care in Somerset has doubled since 2023, according to the council's executive director for children, families and education, Claire Winter. She told councillors that in around 16 per cent of cases, children entering care could potentially have avoided doing so if support had arrived earlier.

There is also a significant issue with where children in care are living. Around 23 per cent of Somerset's looked-after children are in residential care, compared with a national average of around ten per cent.

That matters both for children and for the council's finances. Residential placements can be substantially more expensive than foster or other family-based care, while the council says evidence also shows poorer long-term outcomes for many children growing up in residential settings.

So what exactly is My World, My Tomorrow?

It is a five-year transformation programme bringing together several changes Somerset wants to make across children's services. The name itself was chosen by young people following consultation.

The idea is not simply to shave money from the existing service. Somerset says it wants to change the point at which children and families receive help, providing more support before problems reach the stage where a child has to enter care.

It is also intended to build on recommendations made following Ofsted's recent inspection of children's services.

What will the £7m be spent on?

The programme has four main strands:

• Helping more children in care live with families: Somerset wants to move suitable children out of residential placements and into family-based care, improve placement stability and help more children return home where that can be done safely.
• Increasing fostering capacity: The council wants to recruit and retain more foster carers, give existing carers greater support and make better use of the foster homes already available.
• Supporting children before they enter care: More emphasis will be put on working with families earlier and speeding up progress on child protection plans, with the aim of preventing avoidable entries into care.
• Getting better value from residential providers: Somerset wants to make sure the prices it pays external providers are fair and transparent, rather than simply absorbing ever-rising placement costs.

The council has approved up to £7m to deliver the programme, although £1m of that will be kept back as contingency. That final £1m can only be released if the council's new chief financial officer decides it is necessary.

Does Somerset have enough foster carers?

Not yet — but the picture is slightly better than in many other areas.

Winter told councillors that Somerset has achieved a net increase in foster carers over the past two years, bucking a national trend which has seen numbers fall sharply. The problem is that the increase has still not been large enough to meet demand.

Increasing the number of foster placements available is therefore a major part of the programme. The council also wants fewer carers to leave the system and hopes existing foster households will be able to support more children where appropriate.

How much money does the council think this will save?

The headline target is more than £28.4m in cashable financial benefits by 2031/32.

That is not £28.4m sitting waiting to be collected. The savings depend on the programme actually succeeding — for example by reducing expensive residential placements, preventing some children from entering care and getting better prices from external providers.

In other words, Somerset is spending money now in the hope of reducing a much larger bill later.

Is this just another council savings programme?

The council insists it is not simply about cutting spending. Its argument is that many of the changes which cost less — particularly helping children remain safely with families or move into foster care — should also produce better outcomes for children.

Winter told the council's executive that outcomes for children in residential care can be poor as they move into adulthood, making reducing unnecessary residential placements about considerably more than balancing a spreadsheet.

Council leader Bill Revans has similarly described the scheme as an "investment in prevention", arguing that continuing with rapidly escalating demand and costs is not sustainable.

Where does the council's wider financial crisis fit in?

Very much in the background.

Somerset Council has been working through severe financial pressures and was recently issued with a Best Value Notice by the Government, while a review by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy has added to calls for the authority to increase the pace of change.

Against that backdrop, transformation programmes such as My World, My Tomorrow are central to the council's attempt to make its finances sustainable. Children's services is particularly important because relatively small changes in the number of very expensive placements can have a sizeable effect on the overall budget.

Revans said the Best Value Notice and CIPFA review had reinforced something the council already knew: change needs to happen faster.

What happens next?

The programme will run over five years, meaning there will not be an overnight fall in either care numbers or costs. Its success will depend on whether Somerset can recruit and retain foster carers, intervene effectively with struggling families and reduce its dependence on costly residential placements.

And the £28.4m savings figure will ultimately be one of the clearest tests. Spending £7m to save more than £28m sounds attractive on paper; the difficult part now is turning a transformation plan into fewer children needing crisis intervention and fewer millions leaving the council's accounts.

For families, that means the real measure will not simply be whether Somerset hits its savings target by 2031/32. It will be whether children receive the right help early enough that fewer of them need the most disruptive — and most expensive — forms of care in the first place.

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