At the recent Ordinary Council, Leader of the Council, Cllr Mrs Louise McKinlay presented a robust Budget for 2011-12 which will see no rise in Brentwood’s Council Tax and, despite having to make savings of around two and a half million pounds, no reduction in core, front-line services.
With income falling from services such as car parking and planning applications, and ever-increasing demands on expenditure, a balanced budget was always going to be a challenge, but one that the Conservative led Council rose to and delivered.
‘Brentwood has been hit by the greatest reduction in government subsidy in the County, and one of the harshest across the whole country,’ said Cllr Mrs McKinlay. ‘Cuts of 16.2% or £2.3m are severe but we started the budget process earlier this year, determined to protect the services which are so important to Brentwood residents.
Part of the budgetary process was ‘Your Brentwood, Your Budget’, through which residents were included in the decision making more than ever before. ‘Since becoming Leader I have encouraged greater openness and that has paid off with our residents telling us what their priorities are. The response to this consultation was ten times greater than ever before and we learned a lot about our residents’ wishes.’
‘I must thank the staff at the Town Hall who have given up some of their benefits, as well as Councillors for agreeing to forego the inflationary rise due AND taking a further ten percent cut. We ARE all in it together, and I am proud how everyone has been so supportive of the changes we must make.’
Cllr Roger Hirst, the Deputy Leader, also explained about the challenges the Council continues to face.
‘We had already made three million pounds of savings, so to find another two and a half million was going to be tough. We are doing ‘more with less’ – recycling is up, our delivery of the Winter Maintenance Plan was the envy of the County, and savings are being wrought across the Borough,’ said Cllr Hirst.
‘These decisions have not been easy,’ said Cllr Mrs McKinlay. ‘However, let us not forget these cuts are as the result of the Labour government’s excessive, uncontrolled spending that simply could not go on. Nationally, the Conservative-led Coalition faced a position whereby the Labour government was spending more on interest on the national debt than on education. Across the country, Conservative councils are making sensible changes to how they run so that the national debt can be reduced.’
Decisions taken include sharing back office functions such as HR, improving the procurement process to deliver better value for money and building on partnership arrangements with other Local Authorities.
The final Council Tax rate will be set next week once Essex County Council, Essex Police and Essex Fire Service have set their own budgets.