Budget dilemma for council (From Free Press Series)

Budget dilemma for council

THE ELDERLY in care and schoolchildren will be the first affected if Monmouthshire's cabinet decides to cut services to claw its way out of a cash crisis.

The cabinet faces a million pound overspend across three key departments, Lifelong Learning and Leisure, Social Services and Environment, because of a combination of increased demand and a poor cash settlement from the government.

Members of the cabinet have been presented with three possible solutions to choose from by Steve Greenslade, Corporate Director for Resources.

But those options represent a difficult choice for cabinet members who meet on Thursday to decide whether to cut services for the county's most vulnerable groups, raise council tax for 2004/5, or return to full council for a second time to ask permission to delve into the authority's reserve funds.

The cabinet asked council to make £927,000 available to cover the overspend in December but was refused.

But in a report, Mr Greenslade warned: "Increasing council tax would result in a three per cent increase in council tax over and above the rise needed to fund 2004/5 service delivery.

"Given the stage of the financial year and the levels of overspend forecast, I have doubts that reducing services to budget is achievable but attempting it would obviously result in severe reductions in service."

Leader of the conservative group, Andrew Crump, called the proposal to use reserve funds the "easy option".

He said: "To run a business you have to stay within budget. If reserve funding is used it will not be without lots of noise and criticism."

But deputy leader Mike Smith hit back and said: "What are reserve funds for? We have 2.5 million pounds in reserves which is only half what the district auditor says we should have for a local authority our size, but it's not the auditor's responsibility to provide services to Monmouthshire.

"These departments eat up 80 per cent of the council's budget. Any cuts we have to make will impact severely on the elderly in social care - we have a growing elderly population, one of the biggest in Wales.

"Schools would also need to make savings rather than go into deficit budget which means making staff redundant.

"And the most flexible expenditure in the Environment department is probably the highways department meaning lack of money for road repairs."