{"id":745490,"date":"2026-08-21T21:16:21","date_gmt":"2026-08-21T21:16:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/745490\/"},"modified":"2026-08-21T21:16:21","modified_gmt":"2026-08-21T21:16:21","slug":"northamptonshire-council-use-ai-to-find-savings-of-47-5m","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/745490\/","title":{"rendered":"Northamptonshire council use AI to find savings of \u00a347.5m"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Two local authorities will use artificial intelligence (AI) to help bridge multi-million pound budget gaps.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">West Northamptonshire Council (WNC) identified a \u00a324m budget gap for 2027\/28, while North Northamptonshire Council (NNC) will need to find \u00a313.6m.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Both councils have started cost cutting measures including using artificial intelligence (AI) across services like adult social care \u2014 an area where they have previously seen a spending increase. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">A study by the BBC Shared Data Unit <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/cdx7r9467kno\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">identified 218 upper-tier councils<\/a> would need to make a total of \u00a33.2bn in cuts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Both councils, controlled by Reform UK, have introduced AI in adult social care to improve and make services more efficient.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">They have seen a rise in spending across adult social care and children&#8217;s services which has put pressure on other services.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">At NNC, AI is being used to transcribe conversations and save staff time so they can spend longer prioritising residents&#8217; care and support needs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">WNC has trialled using an AI chatbot on WhatsApp for adult social care questions, using it to screen initial requests for education, health and care plans to reduce the backlog and has approved technology for adults to be supported to live independently with the help of digital tools.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Caroline Abrahams, charity director at Age UK, raised concerns.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">She said there is an &#8220;inevitable risk&#8221; of inaccuracy or misunderstanding with transcription and said any technology being incorporated into care for elderly or vulnerable adults needs to be designed to meet their needs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">A Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government spokesperson said the government does not &#8220;mandate&#8221; how local authorities use AI but encourages its use to &#8220;alleviate pressures&#8221;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two local authorities will use artificial intelligence (AI) to help bridge multi-million pound budget gaps. West Northamptonshire Council&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":745491,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[554,733,4308,86,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-745490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=745490"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/745490\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/745491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=745490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=745490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=745490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}