One of the arguments over whether Councils can cut spending without cutting front line services is over the question on "non-jobs." Those who claim that service cuts are inevitable insist that the occiaisional esoteric job title is a distraction. The salaries of these tiny number of posts being trivial among the total Council budget. That […]
The Times splashes (£) this morning with the claim: "Councils hit households with £400 extra charges." But the claim unravels when we see their example of page 8 of a "typical" example with a bill to "The Everyman Family, 25 Any Street…" But then the list includes the biggest increases they could find anywhere (for instance […]
After the Daily Mail yesterday another pasting for Manchester City Council's wasteful spending. Today it comes in the Sunday Times which says (£) that "council chiefs are engaged in the equivalent of shroud-waving, making highly visible cuts to the services people know and value, rather than taking an axe to their own bureaucracies. It adds: Those bureaucracies […]
As noted earlier Birmingham City Council, a Conservative/Lib Dem coalition, is seeking to tackle its chronic overmanning with the minimum of compulsory redundancies. Shadow Communities Secretary Caroline Flint got herself into a muddle talking about 26,000 job losses. The figure is actually 7,300 – of which 4,300 are being cut and 3,000 moved into a […]
Last year Labour-run Manchester City Council spent over £43 million on debt interest. You would have thought that before cutting front line services they would have a rigorous look at their asset management to see if this cost could be cut. Yet the Daily Mail reports that they have refused to even consider selling the Manchester […]
Brighton & Hove City Council’s Conservative Administration has unveiled its budget proposals for 2011/12, the centre-piece of which is a 1% reduction in Council Tax. This would be the first Council Tax decrease in the history of the City Council and would leave residents in a ‘Band D’ home almost £60 better off than if […]
After the Lib Dem council leaders letter to The Times, the media are understandably sniffing around to see if some Conservative Council leaders can be persuaded to break ranks and criticise Eric Pickles and the grant cuts. Thus far the results have proved unspectacular. However the Financial Times reports (£) a couple of examples. You will […]
Scottish Conservatives want any future Council Tax increase above inflation by any Council to be agreed by local people in a local referendum. The call comes as the Conservative Group on Dundee Council is moving an amendment on the budget that would band D council tax in that area fall by £7. Speaking in the […]
I try to avoid writing about my own council of Hammersmith and Fulham with undue frequency – but if you think it gets a lot of mentions here just try Hansard. During the Local Government Finance debate on Wednesday, the Labour MP for Hammersmith, Andrew Slaughter and some of his colleagues, came out with a series of […]
Another Conservative council that is avoiding cutting front line services is Ribble Valley. Their Council leader, Cllr Michael Ranson, says: "Like all other local authorities, Ribble Valley Borough Council has seen a large reduction in financial support from the government, but this reduction was inevitable and we have been preparing for it forsome time. "We […]
Congratulations to Conservative-run Medway Council who have found the required £23 million savings without cutting front line services. The details are here. Cllr Alan Jarrett, deputy leader of the council, and cabinet member for finance, said: "We're planning to introduce them in such a way that the effects are actually minimal on the consumers and […]
Cllr Richard Kemp, leader of the Lib Dem Group on the Local Government Association has evidently been busy. There is a letter (£) in The Times this morning from 88 Lib Dem council group leaders attacking the Government. The letter says councils are "being let down by the Communities and Local Government Secretary." It adds that […]
Cllr Graham Chapman, Deputy Leader of Labour-run Nottingham City Council, was interviewed on Radio 4 Today programme whining about the supposed severity of his council's funding settlement and assuring listeners how they had already "cut to the bone." He would have more credibility if Nottingham was not among the tiny number of councils in England still refusing […]
Labour councils cutting front line services and then blaming the Government is becoming a familiar pattern. But Sir Richard Leese, the leader of Manchester City Council, offers one of the most brazen examples. Refuse collection will become fortnightly. Street cleaning is being cut. Libraries are being closed – without even giving volunteers the opportunity to […]
Three flagship councils have today published landmark proposals for combined services in a move to protect the frontline by cutting overhead and management costs in half. Hammersmith & Fulham Council (H&F), the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea (RBKC) and Westminster City Council (WCC) say that combining back office and management costs will save a […]