Council that ran up £1.8bn debt agrees £51m services cuts

A council which built up debts of £1.8bn after a failed commercial investment programme has approved making £51m of cuts.

Warrington Borough Council invested in an energy firm which collapsed, as well as a bank, a Texan oil firm and property across the country.

Councillors have now approved plans to make significant cuts to adult social care, as well as cutting more than 200 jobs.

The Labour-run authority said it was part of a "credible programme of transformation".

Labour's Denis Matthews, responsible for finance, said the council was facing an "unprecedented financial challenge", adding that he "accepted" the financial problems partly stem from an "overambitious commercial approach".

Security will be removed from Warrington's bus interchange, road sweeping and weed removal will be cut from the highway network.

But adult social care will face the largest savings - totalling £34m - partly funded by reviewing care packages.

Matthews warned failing to make the savings would "create the risk" of the council "failing to meet its statutory obligations in future years".

He said the authority was moving towards a "new more stable, simplified financial future" in which it would "keep cutting grass, filling potholes and emptying your bins".

Leader of the opposition Liberal Democrats Ian Marks said he was "horrified with the state of the council", claiming staff morale was "dreadful" and the atmosphere was "toxic".

He said the authority was now being "forced" into "fire sales" of its assets by government envoys who had been appointed to get the council on a less risky financial footing.

The council had invested locally in property, including Birchwood Park and the Times Square town centre redevelopment.

But it also injected public funds nationally and internationally, including into a Texas-based oil company, solar farms in Yorkshire and Gloucestershire, and a skyscraper in central Manchester.

The authority also controversially invested £30m in a bank and £10m buying 50% of an energy firm that collapsed in 2024.

The level of debt led to government intervention, which resulted in the appointment of ministerial envoys.

They concluded all the council's investments except for loans to housing associations "had failed to generate surplus income".

Earlier this year the council's leadership said its commercial approach had led to the council taking on too much risk and "had failed".

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