Council cuts just keep on coming

This and other measures were revealed at a meeting in Chippenham on Monday night, where residents were invited to discuss the council’s financial difficulties before it sets its budget next month.

Wiltshire Council has identified more than 100 areas where savings can be made, in an attempt to counteract inflation, a drop of £15.2m in Government funding, and the increased demand on services from a growing elderly population and 2,000 new households each year.

Councillor Dick Tonge, cabinet minister for finance, told the meeting in Chippenham: “Street lighting will not be on between midnight and 5.30am.

“We will change the Household Recycling Centres’ opening times; they open when nobody goes so what’s the point?”

Leader of the council Jane Scott added: “We are going to charge for green waste collection, that will be £1m coming in.

“The recruitment of staff to posts that haven’t been filled this year will go.”

She said there were also big savings planned in procurement. “Every single contract we have, we will make sure we are getting more for our money.”

Residents were also told to expect a “small increase” in fees and charges.

Charities are likely to be hit too, as the council looks at reducing by 10 per cent the amount it currently gives to the voluntary services sector in subsidies.

Coun Scott said they had protected the voluntary sector budgets for five years but now they would have to cut their back office costs.

She said: “We have protected their budgets and grants all the way through the recession and we had to say, we have to change our relationship with you.

“Our back office costs are six per cent while they are something like 12-15 per cent in the voluntary sector.”

Town and parish councils were told they would have to pay for their own by-elections from April 1.

Coun Tonge told members present that Wiltshire Council was keen to delegate “very local” services, such as public toilets, some community centres, play areas and grass cutting.

Devizes residents can have their say at a meeting on Tuesday, at the Corn Exchange at 5.30pm. The budget will be decided at full council on February 24.

Roads to get 21m a year

Another council priority was said to be boosting the economy by creating new jobs and protecting existing ones.

It is to invest £65 million in providing infrastructure and jobs, including dualling the A350 at Chippenham and Porton Science Park near Salisbury.

The £3.5m scheme currently underway to dual the A350 between Jackson’s Lane and Morrisons is due to be complete in March. 

A second £3.3m phase, to extend dualling from Brook roundabout (near the bottom of the Cepen Park North estate) down to Bumpers Farm roundabout (Bristol Road), is due to start this summer. 

Work on the final £7.1m phase, to complete dualling as far as the Chequers roundabout (Sainsbury’s), is to start in 2017. Half of the overall funding is coming from the Government.

Jeremy Comerford, a resident of The Butts, Chippenham, asked if the dualling of the A350 was being done because of The Range application.

Coun Scott replied: “We planned to do that for many, many years, we were always just waiting for the money. 

“It is nothing to do with The Range. I cannot talk about The Range as it is a live planning application so that would be illegal.”

Coun Tonge said they would be investing £21m a year for the next six years in resurfacing roads – and he hoped this 80 per cent increase in funds would fix them properly instead of patching them up.
The council will also spend £66 million to deliver community campuses.

‘Bear with us’ plea after savings

A corporate director for Wiltshire Council said it is working more efficiently since its management team was halved.

Last year the council saved £25 million, partly by cutting its managers by 50 per cent and reducing staff overall by 12 per cent.

Andrew Noblett, a former Chippenham Town Council leader, asked on Monday how this decline in management had affected services.

Dr Carlton Brand, one of three corporate directors, said: “It has taken out a layer of management, most of which delayed things, so it is much faster.”

She made a plea to residents to bear with them if their telephone calls took a while to be answered.
“In the last four to five years we have had to get rid of 800 staff,” she said.

“We’re putting money into frontline services rather than answering phones. Please bear with us.”
The council also saved money by sharing buildings with Wiltshire Police, as in Chippenham, and Coun Dick Tonge suggested this concept should be extended to healthcare in the future.

Hints at tax rise in future

JANE Scott has warned that council tax cannot be capped indefinitely, at a time the council has to save £30 million in the coming year.

Wiltshire residents have not had a council tax rise for four years and there is no increase proposed this year, despite the tax collecting just £250 million compared with £900 million in the council’s outgoings.

Coun Dick Tonge told the 50 in attendance on Monday that Wiltshire residents were lucky, because they pay only £1,222 a year for a band D payment compared with £1,488 in Shropshire.

Coun Scott defended the cap on council tax throughout the recession. When Ramsbury parish councillor Sheila Glass questioned the wisdom of keeping the tax the same, in light of the savings that had to be made, Coun Scott replied: “Through this recession, I think it has been the right thing to do.

“Our economy works on small and medium-sized enterprises. Council tax was one way of us helping them through these difficult times. It is absolutely not to do with politics.”

But she added: “There will come a time where we are getting to the point we cannot continue with that, so I think we will increase council tax in the future.”

PROTECTING THE VULNERABLE

Leader of Wiltshire Council Jane Scott has promised to protect spending on vulnerable adults and children.

Mrs Scott told Monday’s public budget meeting in Chippenham: “If we do nothing else, we need to protect the vulnerable in our communities.

“That is the most important thing, protecting those vulnerable people who cannot look after themselves.”
But she warned that even though spending would not be cut for people who may need care because of disability, age or illness, it would only be the same as last year. 

So these services would still feel the pinch as needs increase, especially, said Councillor Dick Tonge, since Wiltshire’s older population is 15 per cent higher than the national average and growing.