East Sussex CC’s chief executive Becky Shaw has laid out a ‘core offer’ that could risk the council’s ‘ability to meet statutory guidance and deadlines’.

In a report to senior councillors next week, Ms Shaw said the council was ‘using its best endeavours to live within its means’ but warned it was ‘unlikely that even the core offer will be sustainable by the end of the next three-year planning period’.

The core offer has been drawn up after savings of £129m made over the last eight years, but although it has identified savings of £12.3m there remains a £33.4m deficit.

Ms Shaw wrote: ‘The core offer is an articulation of what we believe local people most need from the council.

‘It will act as a focus for our planning on how best to deploy the £390m per annum funding we will have by 2021/22.

‘Some element of preventative services are included in the core offer where they prevent immediate need for more costly interventions.

‘Enabling people to help themselves to live independently gives better health, wellbeing and quality of life for individuals and families, and reduces the need for more costly intervention in the very short-term.

‘The core offer is not the ideal that we would wish to be able to provide but seeks to capture what is most appropriate and possible in a time of austerity.’