Social services across Europe are facing increased financial pressure due to budget cuts, while in many cases experiencing increased demand for support. International experts and practitioners gathered at the 2026 European Social Services Conference organised by the European Social Network to discuss how social services decision-makers and directors can create financially sustainable social protection services.

Find new sources of income

TUSLA, the Irish child protection agency, could tap into a new government resource funded through ‘dormant funds’ on savings accounts to set up a more child-friendly judiciary system, where children surviving abuse can tell their story in a protected, child-friendly environment – the Barnahus (House of the Child).

Invest better and more strategically 

Bucharest City Council is changing its social protection model from a heavily cash-transfer-based support system to a more social support-based model, where professionals help people in need through regular counselling. Mădălina Radu, senior advisor to the mayor, explained: “With the money that we are saving from reorganising this cash transfer system, we are strengthening and developing municipal services that we consider strategic, for instance, we create safe infrastructure and services for survivors of domestic violence.” 

Finance outcomes, not just services

Pablo Annys, deputy mayor in Bruges (Belgium) explained that a change in the funding system to more outcome-based financing is required: “If the state bases its model more on outcomes, there is less reporting paperwork, so you free up time to do what cities have to do to help the people in need.”

Monitor funding flows at EU, national, and local levels

Decision-makers are confronted with competing funding requests and to justify their decisions, ministers need to know whether resources are aligned with the needs of their populations and therefore lead to the desired outcomes. World Bank’s Cassandra Simmons therefore warned that: “if financing flows are not visible and well understood, systems cannot be managed strategically or improved sustainably. Similarly, without robust and comparable data, countries cannot effectively learn from one another’s experience.” She recommended that EU, national, and local governments develop a framework to classify social services expenditure and coverage and to link these data to outcomes.

Get the full picture to avoid undesired effects

A missing aspect in the service financing debate is the contribution of family carers. Adelina Comas Herrera, director at the Global Observatory of Long-Term Care, highlighted the need to capture their contribution to sustain our care system, while mitigating the undesired effects of informal caring, such as reduced labour market participation and, as a consequence, old-age poverty for those who did not build up their pensions while caring for their loved ones. 

Strengthen community-based services and prevention 

Early intervention and community-based care can help avoid more costly and intensive care interventions at a later stage. “Investments in these types of services can relieve pressure from cost-intensive residential services”, said Comas-Herrera. In the case of long-term care, this can help prevent people from moving to care homes at an early stage, and in the case of state care for children, it can help shield them from the long-term effects of lacking family-based care.

Stand in for social budgets 

Decision makers and social service directors need to stand in for maintaining social investment, as Madalina Radu put it: “We need to be more courageous and bolder when we frame the strategic importance of social services with our governments, with our decision makers”. Social services have strong allies in this regard, as explained by Adelina Comas: “Politicians need to see fiscal sustainability together with political sustainability. Voters want a good system that supports them.” 

Call to action: 

• One way to take immediate action is to join ESN on 11 June at the European Parliament to debate the importance of maintaining dedicated funds for social services under the new EU budget. You can register for the event here.
• To be better informed about social investment and social services coverage in your country, we recommend reading ESN's latest Social Services Index. An EU-wide comparison of countries is available here.
• Those interested in recommendations for funding long-term care systems, can read ESN’s latest publication Financing Long-Term Care – A Social Services Perspective