Hull council chief on his pride at Covid-19 response, the financial impact of the crisis and planning for a second wave

Council chief: Matt Jukes. Image by Tom Arran Commercial Photography

Hull City Council Chief Executive Matt Jukes spoke exclusively with Rick Lyon about the impact of the Covid-19 crisis. Here’s the interview in full

What’s your verdict on the council’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic?

“What has been a revelation to me has been the passion and commitment of our staff. There are some absolutely amazing people who work at the council, who are so dedicated. The response to Covid has been a case in point.

“For me, I’ve been extremely proud and I’ve watched in awe at some of the things our people have done.

“I think the one thing I’ve found different in this job, compared to the private sector, is the level of criticism that gets laid at the door of the public sector. I understand the politics aspect of that, but what upset me – and not for me personally, because when you do senior jobs you are sticking your head above the parapet – is that people don’t always recognise that there are staff working for us who really care about this place.

“For example, when the information came through about the shielded population, who had medical conditions, we’d already gone through everybody we had contacted with ourselves to get in touch with these people. We walked dogs, we carried out food deliveries – and those teams came together from every service.

“When we had to lock down the office and mobilise people very quickly for home working, we had hundreds of people come forward to do that – manning phones and ringing people up to check they were OK. It was really humbling to see that. People don’t always see it but I’ve had some really positive feedback from those who received that help.

“It wasn’t just the council, of course, and the wider community response has been immense.”

Just how difficult has the challenge presented by the pandemic been?

“It’s the most difficult set of circumstances this organisation has ever faced. We had the floods of 2007 and 2013 but with incidents like that you set up your emergency response and then, after two or three days, you are in recovery. That’s the way those major incidents always play out – but not with this.

“We work with the Humber Local Resilience Forum (a multi-agency partnership of representatives from the local authorities, public services, emergency services, NHS, the Environment Agency and others) and that response was stood up and ran for months, with calls twice a day right throughout that period.

“First and foremost, the challenge was the duration – keeping that level of response up for a long period of time is very difficult and very draining. All councils will have had to have deal with that to a greater or lesser degree but I think they would all say that it’s the duration that is the main challenge.

“Some of our services are starting to get back to normal but others, such as adult social care, are still in response mode, and our public health teams are now very much at the forefront of trying to manage this going forward locally.”

How badly has the crisis hit the council financially?

“Austerity has hit our city hard. Our annual budget is about £750m but some of that has to be spent on certain things, so we don’t have that whole pot to cut from.

“In real term spend, we’ve lost about 35 per cent of our capacity in the last 10 years We’ve been one of the hardest hit authorities in the country in that respect.

“We’ve had a lot to work through and the scale of the operation has changed immensely. From when we had the floods in 2007 – one of the biggest challenges to this point – to now, we’ve lost about half our staff.

“We now have just under 5,000 staff, whereas back then we had just over 10,000. So, apart from the funding, the capacity to deal with the challenges has reduced significantly.

“We’d managed over the past four or five years to get the council onto a stable footing. Pre-Covid, we weren’t needing to make any major savings this year and we’d started to build up our reserves.

“From our perspective, we’ve now been hit in two ways with Covid, in terms of the economy. We’ve obviously spent a lot more than we anticipated in terms of our response. For example, if you look at the adult social care response, in addition to keeping all those services, we’ve been providing PPE and advice and guidance.

“The Government talk about the allocation of £3.2bn to help local councils. We always say you should look at population and demand and in the first tranche they did, but then in the second tranche they just looked at population which meant richer areas were getting more than we were.

“We got about £17m from that £3.2bn and that’s really helped, because that’s a cash flow issue. The issue we have is that our income has dropped. We are dependent on two sources of income – central government grants, which have been cut by £160m, and local business rates and council tax.

“About 80 per cent is local government grants, which is why it hurts us more when it is cut because that’s a bigger share of our money. Business rates and council tax are a big thing too and we’ve seen a massive drop off financially in both of those as businesses have closed and people have lost their jobs.

“What we’ve got now is a developing financial hole and, by the end of this year, it will be about £35m.

“We’re starting to think about the savings we might make and that is very difficult because of the savings we’ve already made. The danger is that you start cutting into key services that people need.

“We are not alone. Places like Leeds are in a similar situation. So, we are talking to the Government about that, because the last thing we want to do is cut services to residents.

“Councils do have to balance budgets though. By law, we have to make sure the money coming in matches the money going out. We are working closely with the Government but we are unclear at the moment how we can do that.

“Our budget process starts in the autumn and I would certainly hope we will not face any further cuts from the Government in funding. There’s a lot of talk about not returning to austerity and this council cannot live with the kind of cuts we’ve had previously.”

‘CONFIDENT’: Matt Jukes speaking to The Hull Story’s Rick Lyon. Image by Tom Arran Commercial Photography

Will the authority have to cut jobs, as a result of the financial shortfall?

“I hope not.

“I’ve said to our staff – who have been sensational – that we are working hard to get the support we need.

“We also have to plan. We hope and work for the best, and plan for the worst. We are pushing really hard and we are working with our MPs.

“The Government are in crisis mode dealing with the developing situation, so are probably not looking as far ahead as we need to look at the moment, but we are engaging with them.

“So, I sincerely hope not but I can’t rule it out.”

Is the council preparing for a potential second wave and local lockdown?

“I’m not a public health specialist but, having said that, it is prudent to be looking at the arrangements you would have to put in place if cases started to increase again.

“The problem that local government have had across the country is that we were getting the number of tests and the number of positive cases, but we weren’t getting specifically where they were – only that they were in our council area.

“We’ve had to push for more granular data. We are now getting data that gives postcodes but a postcode can be a big area.

“If a person tests positive you want to know where they live, what ethnic group they are in because of the different risk factors, and you would want to know where they work.

“We’ve put a local management outbreak plan in place. The word ‘lockdown’ came from the Government and in some ways that isn’t particularly helpful.

“We get cases most days and we are following those up, giving guidance and advice. If it’s around a premises or a schools, we take action with those contacts – it’s not locking down the whole city.

“That is the way I think it will continue to work, unless you have a major outbreak.

“There is concern about the September-October flu period, which always has a big impact, particularly on our elderly population. That is more likely to be a bigger issue.

“We’re ready to step back into the arrangements we operated previously and the advantage we have now is that we’ve done it once.

“In terms of our care homes response team, for example, we can step that up in 24 hours now. There will be a quick response. We’ve learned lessons and we are more prepared in that sense.”

Is this the biggest crisis Hull has ever faced and are you confident the city will recover?

“It’s a hell of a challenge.

“I didn’t live through the challenge the city faced during the war. That must have been a very, very difficult time.

“The 2008-2009 recession was also a really tough time, when I was still in the private sector.

“I think it could be a bigger challenge. In terms of people losing their lives and people losing loved ones, only the Second World War has been bigger challenge than this. It has been very, very difficult for a lot of people.

“I think it is certainly one of the biggest challenges but I am confident we will recover.

“We have to encourage people to come back to the city and we have to encourage people to do that safely. I think that will help us immensely.

“Managing this by consent is by far the best way and we’ve found that when we’ve been in contact with people, everyone has co-operated.

“The tension between keeping safe and getting our economy going is not an easy one but if you do follow all the precautions now, that really will help.

“I’m still ambitious and optimistic for the city, I really am, despite all of this. The one thing that Hull has really proved is that you can try and knock us down but we will get up.

“The city is opening for business again and we have some great things going on. I wouldn’t want people to be depressed about the future of the city.

“It is a challenging time for the whole country but when you look at some of the things that are still happening in the city, it’s a great place to be.

“We will get over this. We still have some great plans and we are determined and confident they will happen.”