Local authorities are facing an unprecedented attack on their ability to deliver local services. Weymouth & Portland Borough Council has lost over £2.1 million, Purbeck District Council £725,000, and Dorset County Council has lost an eye-watering £66.5 million worth of funding.
So far, many have not noticed the cuts. Councils have worked hard at identifying efficiencies, changing how services are delivered, and increasing revenue from other sources.
Now, however, Councils have to decide which services can no longer be delivered – and people will start to notice. A recent report by auditors Grant Thornoton suggests some south west councils are at risk of financial failure, and of failing to deliver their statutory obligations.
With the roll-back of council services, the government is increasingly expecting communities, charities and the social enterprise sector to “step up”, and the fill the voids left as council resources shrink. Perhaps that’s what Cameron was getting at with his early ideas for a Big Society (remember that?)
Last Sunday, on a crisp,sunny January morning, my partner Jenny and I – together with my four kids – joined hundreds of local residents who turned out for the Chesil Beach Clean. Recent storms had left Chesil strewn with debris – everything from the usual driftwood and seaweed to netting, bottles, oil drums and even the odd cattle carcass! Local people, local organisations and local businesses pulled together to fill 12 skips – all sponsored – because they love their community and its natural environment.
Stood around a hot urn later drinking well-earned teas and coffees, many remarked how much they had enjoyed pitching in – not just because of the satisfaction of seeing the beach looking clean and clear of debris again, but the actual experience – working together with others for a common purpose. Where the local Councils had insufficient resources to put into a clean-up, local woman Storm Wallace had an idea, and more importantly a belief in her neighbours, that people could and would pull together to help.
Contrast this with Portland Town Council taking a whole other view of how to approach declining Council resources. Eric Pickles’ ill thought-out cap on Council Tax increases has a loophole. Town and Parish Councils have been able to increase Council Tax without the need for a local referendum. Canny District and Borough Councils are therefore devolving responsibilities for some services to Parish or Town level, and those authorities are then free to send local tax precepts rocketing.
And so it was that a motion – proposed by an “Independent” Portland Town Councillor who sat until recently as a Conservative Borough and County Councillor – was approved by Portland Town Council to raise the Council Tax precept from £14 a year on a Band D property to £150. An eye-watering rise of over 1000%!
No consultation was held on this increase, and no one stood on a manifesto setting out this rise for the public to give it a mandate. It seems some Portland Town Councillors could take a leaf out of Storm Wallace’s book, and trust local people to give their energy and ideas to meeting the local needs that deep government cuts are exposing, rather than imposing top-down ideas that hit people hard at a time when few have spare cash.
Labour Councillor Ray Novak has called for wider consultation, and there is to be a public meeting at All Saints Church, Easton this Monday, 27th January at 7pm. The Town Council says this is not a consultative meeting –the vote has already been taken – but I suspect that there might just be a change of heart if the strength of that meeting’s voice says that there is no shortage of willingness to pull together on the island – but local people would at least expect to be involved in the decisions that affect them most.
If you feel as strongly as the many Portlanders that have spoken to me, do go along and make your voice heard.
