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'Heartbreaking' Decisions In Brighton & Hove As Council Attempts To Fill £21m Budget Gap

Friday, 20 January 2023 06:45

By Sarah Booker-Lewis, Local Democracy Reporter

Brighton and Hove City Council faces a “dark chapter”, according to its political leader, as there are limited funds and “few options left”.

This was the bleak prediction by the Green leader of the council Phélim Mac Cafferty as he addressed senior councillors this afternoon (Thursday 19 October).

His comments came at the start of a meeting of the council’s Policy and Resources Committee, before discussions about this year’s over-spending and next year’s budget-setting process.

Councillor Mac Cafferty said:

“The options left locally are dire and, to balance the books, we are facing heart-breakingly difficult decisions.

“I am clear this administration will protect council services where we can but vicious Tory cuts to Brighton and Hove mean there are limited funds and limited options left.

“This is another very dark chapter for our city and the council is likely to look and feel different by the end of the process.

“An example of that is that, to date, we’ve proudly been a high-spending council for things like children’s services. That era looks like it may be over.”

The council’s external auditor’s annual report to the Audit and Standards Committee next Tuesday (24 January) said that the council needed to put an “urgent” focus on its finances.

Councillor Mac Cafferty said:

“The reality is that local government funding is broken and even the government knows it.

“As funding has been cut by over a third in real terms over the last decade, local councils across the country and political spectrum are in desperate financial positions with over 250 opting to increase council tax to its highest rate.

“The government tells us to either fund the gaps through council tax or close down council services.

“Given that council tax funds only 19 per cent of the council’s budget, you can see this isn’t the whole solution to the problem.

“Even the government is starting to acknowledge that more councils will face a ‘section 114’ bankruptcy notice as a result of their funding.

“In a cynical new low, the week the government should have been providing adequate funding for councils in their budget, they advertised for future commissioners who will be sent into councils to run them when they declare bankruptcy.

“Meanwhile, the government lauds its grant funding financing model which today saw Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s leafy rural constituency receive £19 million taxpayers’ cash to ‘level up’.

“These pots are not only undemocratic, they actively contribute to the difficulty all councils are having setting sustainable longer-term financing strategies as they pit local councils against each other.”

The Green administration is putting together its 2023-24 budget and needs to find £22 million in savings because of inflation, pay rises and an increasing demand for services.

When the draft budget went before councillors last month, proposed cuts and savings covered £12.6 million of the shortfall, with a further £8.3 million to be found.

The council is expected to put up council tax by 2.99 per cent and the adult social care precept by 2 per cent when councillors debate the budget on Thursday 23 February.

Residents have been campaigning against cuts. Parents, staff and supporters at Bright Start Nursery, which is earmarked for closure to save £104,000 a year, plan a protest starting from St Peter’s Church at noon on Saturday 4 February.

Supporters of the Early Years Project toy library are protesting outside Hove Town Hall before the full council meeting on Thursday 2 February over a plan to save £9,000 of its £22,000 grant funding.

There are two separate petitions against closing 18 public toilets – one on the council website with more than 4,000 signatures and another on the Change.org website with more than 5,000 signatures.

And this week, on Tuesday (17 January), opposition councillors voted against charging people to use public toilets and slammed proposals to close 18 toilets in parks and along the seafront.

Conservative and Labour members of the council’s Environment, Transport and Sustainability Committee also voted down increases in parking charges and resident permits and the introduction of parking charges in parks.

The council’s Policy and Resources Committee is due to meet to discuss the budget on Thursday 8 February. The meeting is scheduled to be webcast on the council’s website.

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