Staffordshire County Council: local authority assessment

Published: 30 May 2025 Page last updated: 30 May 2025

Assessment published: 30 May 2025

About Staffordshire County Council

Demographics

Staffordshire County Council is the upper-tier local authority for the non-metropolitan county of Staffordshire, located in the West Midlands of England. It is home to over 898,000 residents who live across the county’s eight districts of Staffordshire Moorlands, East Staffordshire, Lichfield, Tamworth, Cannock Chase, South Staffordshire, Stafford, and Newcastle-under-Lyme. The county of Staffordshire had an Index of Multiple Deprivation score of 3 (1 is the least deprived, 10 is the most deprived), placing it 117th out of 153 local authorities for deprivation in England.

The population grew by 3.3% between 2011 and 2021 (Office for National Statistics, June 2022), with 19.24% aged 0 to 17 years, 58.38% aged 18 to 64 years, and 22.38% aged 65 years or more. The proportion of the population who are 65 years or over is above the England average of 18.69%. The majority of people in Staffordshire identified as White, making up 93.62% of the population. 0.79% were Black, Black British, Caribbean or African, 3.30% were Asian, Asian British, 1.74% identified themselves as of ‘mixed or multiple’ heritage, and 0.55% identified themselves as Other. The proportion of people identifying as White was significantly higher than the England average of 81.05%, indicating the area was home to small numbers of non-White groups.

The local authority is part of the Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent Integrated Care System, together with one other upper-tier local authority.

The local authority has 62 councillors representing 60 electoral divisions. At the time of this assessment, Staffordshire County Council was under a Conservative majority control. Following the election on 1 May 2025, they are now under a Reform UK majority control.

Financial facts

The financial facts for Staffordshire County Council are:

The Local Authority’s estimated total budget for 2023/24 was £1,060,812,000. Its actual spend for the year was £1,075,800,000, which was £14,988,000 more than estimated.
The local authority estimated it would spend £304,158,000 of its total budget on Adult Social Care in 2023/24. Its actual spend was £327,758,000, which is 30.47% of the total budget and £23,600,000 more than estimated.
The local authority has raised the full adult social care precept for 2023/24, with a value of 2%.
Approximately 15,130 people were accessing long-term Adult Social Care support, and approximately 2,050 people were accessing short-term Adult Social Care support in the 2023/24 period. 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.