PUBLIC consultation meetings are set to take place next month as Monmouthshire council announced its budget saving proposals for the next financial year.

The cabinet met yesterday to discuss the “massive pressure” placed on the council after the Welsh Government’s recent budget settlement.

A further £20.7 million of savings is needed from 2015/16 to 2018/19 on top of the £7 million savings delivered for this financial year.

On October 8, public services minister Leighton Andrews announced Monmouthshire would receive 4.3 per cent less in Revenue Support Grant for 2015/16 than the previous year — the biggest reduction in Gwent.

A report presented at the cabinet meeting in Usk County Hall yesterday said October’s announcement “effectively means a 20 per cent reduction on our controllable budget over five years”.

The report also said: “After several years of reducing budgets, the means of achieving further savings becomes increasingly challenging.”

It highlighted possible problems in the delivery of some services, which included teachers’ pensions, children’s social services, Monmouth Leisure Centre, and pressures in social care.

Under the proposals, more than £500,000 would be cut in the development of leisure services, while more than £1.2 million could be cut as part of a transformation of adult social care. But the draft savings, of just over £10 million, only represent half of what needs to be saved in that four-year period.

Councillor Peter Fox, leader of the council, said: “It came as a real shock to us when we saw this cut. That is a massive pressure.”

He insisted no final decision has been made and the proposals are merely open to public views following cabinet members’ passing of the recommendation.

A number of public engagement sessions will be held in the first two weeks of December to get public opinion. Consultation will end on January 14 next year. Final budget proposals will have to be approved by January 22.