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A demonstration last week protesting Town Hall cuts
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Our budget is fair and honours our promises
Town Hall finance chief Cllr Janet Grauberg defends the Lib Dem/Tory coalition’s budget
BEING shouted at is the price you pay for the privilege of making decisions. There was plenty of shouting about the Budget last week – but also some important decisions being made. There’s always plenty of scepticism about politicians being elected saying one thing and doing another when they get into power.
That’s why right from the start we were committed to delivering our pledges to freeze Camden’s share of council tax at this year’s level. Along with keeping promises to reform the parking regime, save all three pools at Kentish Town Baths and to secure more secondary school places, the Liberal Democrat-Conservative partnership administration is demonstrating how it is acting on the promises it made.
Nearly 100,000 households pay council tax in Camden, with the lowest paid contributing the highest proportion of their income. They all stand to benefit from our commitment to sticking by this decision.
On reading the papers you could, of course, be forgiven for assuming that this was at the expense of the quality of local services. But we were clear – we were elected to move resources to the services that the people of Camden need and want. And so we’re spending around £50 more per person this year than last, while still freezing our share of the council tax bills.
This means we are able to make sure we meet our responsibilities for the old and vulnerable in our society who need the care the council provides, and also start to put money into preventive services to keep people independent for longer.
It means we are able to respond to the messages from our Budget Consultation about crime and fear of crime to fund an extra 18 police community support officers, matched by 10 additional police officers from the Metropolitan Police, to boost visible policing in Camden Town and really make an impact on the drug dealing in that area.
It means we are able to start delivering our commitments to transform Camden into a place where people have an influence on the decisions the council makes. We are funding a youth council to allow young people from across the borough make their voices heard.
In order to put these additional resources into priority areas we knew we had to take the decision to take a long hard look at the way the council operates and where it could save money. We
n asked every department to make 2.5 per cent efficiency savings, saving £6 million;
n saved £3.5 million from buying goods and services in a more streamlined manner;
n asked the council to save five per cent from the costs of its staff – ie to manage on 95 per cent of its spending this year.
This means that around 260 posts are going across the council, of which about 100 were vacant or filled by agency staff. The unions have opposed this from the start, but the simple truth is that, under the previous administration, the last five years saw a 35 per cent increase in staffing costs which we are now starting to turn around. Some of the changes we have made include cutting out layers of management and joining teams together, using technology to modernise routine tasks such as the paying of invoices, and thinking about things from a “customer” point of view.
For example, a new combined reception for council tax and housing benefit services at the Town Hall will stop people traipsing between the first and third floors and save nearly £400,000.
We’ve also taken decisions to stop running services that don't give the best possible value for money. So where we have taken the difficult decision to close, for example Kilburn Grange Park play project, it is for very good reasons. Namely, it costs 80 per cent more than other play services to run, the building is old and falling apart, a new centre has opened 100 yards away and there are guaranteed spaces for the 24 children who use it at play centres nearby. We can’t keep things going just because they’ve always been there and we will always support – in this case, the children, parents and staff – to move to a better and more cost effective solution.
There will be people who disagree with the decisions we’ve made – that is the joy of working within a democratic society and with a free press – but we believe that keeping our election promises, protecting residents’ interests, investing in services for vulnerable people, and improving the efficiency of the way the council does its business are important priorities, and the right ones.
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