Contacting Your Local Council for a Care Needs Assessment
The right to a free needs assessment applies wherever you live in the UK. If you're outside Brighton & Hove or Worthing, here's how to reach the right team — anywhere in the country.
Every council with adult social services must, under the Care Act (and its equivalents across the UK), offer a free needs assessment to any adult who appears to need care — however much money they have. Only the contact details change from place to place.
In Brighton & Hove or Worthing? You're in our home territory — the full step-by-step guide, including what to say and how the money side works, is on our main care needs assessment guide.
Our Part of the South East
These are the councils across our own region and its neighbours, with their adult social care lines. Start typing a postcode or town to jump to yours.
Covers the South East. Elsewhere in the UK? Use the finder in the next section.
Brighton & Hove City Council
Our main service area — see the full guide
Brighton, Hove, Portslade, Rottingdean, Saltdean and Woodingdean.
West Sussex County Council
Our main service area — see the full guide
Worthing, Crawley, Horsham, Chichester, Bognor Regis, Littlehampton, Shoreham, Haywards Heath, Burgess Hill and the rest of West Sussex.
East Sussex County Council
Eastbourne, Hastings, Bexhill, Lewes, Newhaven, Seaford, Uckfield, Crowborough, Rye and Battle.
Surrey County Council
Guildford, Woking, Epsom, Reigate, Redhill, Dorking, Camberley, Farnham, Staines and Leatherhead.
Kent County Council
Maidstone, Canterbury, Ashford, Tunbridge Wells, Tonbridge, Dover, Folkestone, Margate, Dartford and Gravesend.
Hampshire County Council
Winchester, Basingstoke, Andover, Aldershot, Farnborough, Eastleigh, Fareham, Gosport, Havant and the New Forest.
Portsmouth City Council
Portsmouth, Southsea, Cosham and Portsea Island.
Southampton City Council
Southampton, Woolston, Shirley, Portswood and Bitterne.
Not in our South East service area? Every UK council must offer a free assessment — find yours in the UK-wide section below.
Anywhere Else in the UK
England & Wales — go straight to your council
Enter your postcode on GOV.UK and it will route you to your own council's adult social care team: Apply for a needs assessment on GOV.UK.
Scotland
Social care is arranged by your council's social work team. For free, impartial help finding yours, contact Care Information Scotland on 0800 011 3200 (Mon–Fri, 9am–5pm) or visit careinfoscotland.scot. All 32 Scottish councils are listed below.
Northern Ireland
Adult social care is provided by five Health & Social Care Trusts rather than councils. Find and contact your local Trust via nidirect's Health & Social Care Trusts page, or read how to arrange care in NI.
Every Council & Trust, A–Z
Each authority below links to its official website. Search by name to find yours, then look for its adult social care or care needs assessment pages. (For the quickest route to the right team, the GOV.UK postcode finder above is ideal.)
Filters the lists below by name.
England (153)
- Barking and Dagenham
- Barnet
- Barnsley
- Bath and North East Somerset
- Bedford
- Bexley
- Birmingham
- Blackburn with Darwen
- Blackpool
- Bolton
- Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole
- Bracknell Forest
- Bradford
- Brent
- Brighton and Hove
- Bristol
- Bromley
- Buckinghamshire
- Bury
- Calderdale
- Cambridgeshire
- Camden
- Central Bedfordshire
- Cheshire East
- Cheshire West and Chester
- City of London
- Cornwall
- County Durham
- Coventry
- Croydon
- Cumberland
- Darlington
- Derby
- Derbyshire
- Devon
- Doncaster
- Dorset
- Dudley
- Ealing
- East Riding of Yorkshire
- East Sussex
- Enfield
- Essex
- Gateshead
- Gloucestershire
- Greenwich
- Hackney
- Halton
- Hammersmith and Fulham
- Hampshire
- Haringey
- Harrow
- Hartlepool
- Havering
- Herefordshire
- Hertfordshire
- Hillingdon
- Hounslow
- Isle of Wight
- Isles of Scilly
- Islington
- Kensington and Chelsea
- Kent
- Kingston upon Hull
- Kingston upon Thames
- Kirklees
- Knowsley
- Lambeth
- Lancashire
- Leeds
- Leicester
- Leicestershire
- Lewisham
- Lincolnshire
- Liverpool
- Luton
- Manchester
- Medway
- Merton
- Middlesbrough
- Milton Keynes
- Newcastle upon Tyne
- Newham
- Norfolk
- North East Lincolnshire
- North Lincolnshire
- North Northamptonshire
- North Somerset
- North Tyneside
- Northumberland
- North Yorkshire
- Nottingham
- Nottinghamshire
- Oldham
- Oxfordshire
- Peterborough
- Plymouth
- Portsmouth
- Reading
- Redbridge
- Redcar and Cleveland
- Richmond upon Thames
- Rochdale
- Rotherham
- Rutland
- Salford
- Sandwell
- Sefton
- Sheffield
- Shropshire
- Slough
- Solihull
- Somerset
- Southampton
- Southend-on-Sea
- South Gloucestershire
- South Tyneside
- Southwark
- Staffordshire
- St Helens
- Stockport
- Stockton-on-Tees
- Stoke-on-Trent
- Suffolk
- Sunderland
- Surrey
- Sutton
- Swindon
- Tameside
- Telford and Wrekin
- Thurrock
- Torbay
- Tower Hamlets
- Trafford
- Wakefield
- Walsall
- Waltham Forest
- Wandsworth
- Warrington
- Warwickshire
- West Berkshire
- Westminster
- Westmorland and Furness
- West Northamptonshire
- West Sussex
- Wigan
- Wiltshire
- Windsor and Maidenhead
- Wirral
- Wokingham
- Wolverhampton
- Worcestershire
- York
Scotland (32)
- Aberdeen City
- Aberdeenshire
- Angus
- Argyll and Bute
- City of Edinburgh
- Clackmannanshire
- Dumfries and Galloway
- Dundee City
- East Ayrshire
- East Dunbartonshire
- East Lothian
- East Renfrewshire
- Falkirk
- Fife
- Glasgow City
- Highland
- Inverclyde
- Midlothian
- Moray
- Na h-Eileanan Siar (Western Isles)
- North Ayrshire
- North Lanarkshire
- Orkney Islands
- Perth and Kinross
- Renfrewshire
- Scottish Borders
- Shetland Islands
- South Ayrshire
- South Lanarkshire
- Stirling
- West Dunbartonshire
- West Lothian
Wales (22)
Northern Ireland — HSC Trusts (5)
No authority matches that name. Every part of the UK still offers a free assessment — use the GOV.UK finder or national route above.
Regional phone numbers and all links checked August 2026; the A–Z reflects UK councils as at 2026. Council social-care lines change, so the GOV.UK finder and the national routes above are the definitive way to reach the current team. General information, not financial advice.
In Brighton, Hove or Worthing and want a hand?
We help local families prepare for their assessment every week — what to mention, what to ask for, and what good support looks like afterwards.