Reform-led Kent County Council — the local government for Kent, a county in southeast England — on Thursday passed a motion recommending that its Executive direct officers to review translation arrangements so the council can, as a default, stop paying for most interpretation and translation for people who do not speak English, wherever the law allows.
The motion, titled “Cease Paying for Interpreter and Translation Services for Non-English Speaking Public,” was proposed by Sarah Emberson and seconded by Garry Sturley. Kent Online said it was carried 43–23, with three abstentions, at the November 5 meeting of the full council. Reform UK has led the authority since winning 57 of 81 seats in the May 2025 local elections.
The council resolved to: “Recommend to the Executive that it directs relevant Officers to undertake a review of arrangements for translation services, with a view to establishing how the Council could adopt the following approaches as a default position: (a) cease paying for interpretation and translation for non-English speaking members of the public, in the majority of circumstances and in any event only wherever it is lawfully able to do so (b) wherever possible, ‘signpost’ the public to external interpreters, translators and various technological solutions, with a view to the public paying for those as required, (c) use and pay for interpretation and translation only where necessary, including for the meeting of any and all statutory obligations, and always in the use of British Sign Language and Braille.”
In background notes attached to the motion, the Reform group cited identifiable spending of £183,438.25 on interpretation and translation over the past 12 months in the council’s Oracle system, of which 52.7 percent was British Sign Language and Kent Deaf Interpretation Service support. The motion itself says the real cost will be higher, because some spending is coded under professional fees and other budgets. It separately cites £1.2 million for translation supporting unaccompanied asylum-seeking children — minors who arrive in Britain without a parent or guardian — in the past 12 months, “borne by the UK taxpayer, including those from Kent,” and notes that those costs, and similar spending in the council’s community learning service, “could be met partially or in whole via external grant-aid.” Most of the Oracle total is the British Sign Language and deaf provision the motion says should always continue. The £1.2 million is a different, partly grant-aided pot.
The Reform group’s notes, citing the 2021 Census, said 92 languages are spoken in Kent, including 12 United Kingdom languages, and that English is spoken to some degree by 99.8 percent of residents. The group argued that individual responsibility should be encouraged “rather than reliance on the increasingly stretched budget of the Council,” and that the motion “makes a stand against the ‘nanny state'” — “the assumption that KCC should ‘pay for everything.'” Kent County Council “is an English local authority,” the notes say, and ceasing to pay for the public’s interpreter and translation demands “sends the right message.” With mass migration, the group said, demand and cost will rise if the council keeps paying. The default, in its view, should be that people who want translation “should have to pay for them or use one of the translation Apps.”
The same notes record that public bodies have duties under the Equality Act 2010 — Britain’s main anti-discrimination law — the Human Rights Act 1998, and the Public Sector Equality Duty. They say providing interpretation and translation is not a specific statutory duty of Kent County Council, and that language itself is not a protected characteristic. They also note that social services must keep information accessible to people with language barriers or communication needs, including under the Care Act, and that any changes coming out of the review would need an Equality Impact Assessment.
Thursday’s vote tells the Executive to have officers look at how that default could work. It does not, by itself, switch the services off.
