Council to spend £1.4m on cost cutting consultants

Council leader Dan Harrison said closing a £90m budget gap was no easy feat

Leicestershire County Council has announced it is to pay consultants £1.4m to carry out a cost cutting review.

The Reform UK-led authority said it had launched a "top-to-bottom" analysis of its £1.3bn annual spending.

Consultancy firm Newton has been commissioned to carry out the task rather than the members of the party's own "Doge" team.

Council leader Dan Harrison said the exercise would identify savings many times higher than the fee being paid to the firm and would help the authority close a £90m gap between what it spends annually and its income.

However, Michael Mullaney, leader of the council's Liberal Democrat opposition group, said he had doubts the review would find substantial savings.

"£1.4m is a lot of money to spend on consultants to cut costs," Mullaney said.

"The reality is the council has been cutting its spending for years and if there were more savings to be found, they would have been identified."

The council said initial opportunities to speed up existing savings projects were expected in December and more detailed recommendations would follow early in 2026.

It said the review would focus on prevention - supporting residents before they need help from the council and managing growing demand for services.

The consultants will also look to see if they can save the council money on contract procurement, as well as ways to improve efficiency and maximise income.

Reform said the review would help it set its first budget early next year

Harrison said: "Residents are expecting us to reduce costs and that's what we're doing.

"Closing a sizable £90m gap is no easy feat.

"That's why we've brought in leading professionals to look at every inch of the council and help us to bring down costs.

"Newton have a strong track record, across the public and private sectors, and will be led by the evidence.

"This isn't about eking out a few hundred-thousand pounds here and there. This is about working with [lead officers] across the council and our partners to identify and test big opportunities to do things differently."

Harrison previously said Reform UK, which has run the council as a minority administration since May, aimed to set a budget with a 3% council tax increase from April 2026, rather than the 5% maximum allowed by a government-imposed cap.

Harrison Fowler, the council's cabinet member for resources, said: "Getting maximum efficiency for our tax payers is at the heart of this.

"These are very experienced people who will give us the fresh eyes and best practice required for such a major task."