Angus Council’s budget and with it a £19 million three-year savings plan was approved in record time.
In just half an hour, a full meeting of the authority in Forfar rubber-stamped proposals which had come before members after cross-party consideration of plans which leading figures said had been arrived at under the new mantra of ‘need not want’.
Although there were rumblings of grudging acceptance from some quarters of the plans which will see everything from school clothing grants to PE provision being hit, there were no surprises after the council departed from previous protocol and published the budget papers days ahead of Thursday morning’s meeting.
The rural authority is seeking to trim £23m from its budget over the next three years and finance convener Alex King said the radical approach taken for 2014/15 was the first big step along that road.
He repeated the message delivered earlier this week that “the days when the public could assume that ‘the cooncil will dae it’ are past”.
“The 2014/15 budget round was identified at an early stage as being extremely problematic, with the council having to make many very difficult decisions in order to achieve a balanced revenue budget coupled with a demanding yet affordable capital budget,” he said.
“Completing the 2015/16 and 2016/17 budgets is expected to be even more difficult.
“The days of expecting Angus Council to pay for everything that the public would like to have provided either free or at a modest charge directly through a service or services provided by Angus Council are at an end.
“Angus Council has now reached the position where the services it provides must be either statutory or must be subject to a stringent assessment of actual need in the case of services which are discretionary.”
Finance vice-convener and Montrose councillor Bill Duff said: “Certain proposals were rejected as unacceptable, such as reducing the per capita charge in schools, but this is an area where we simply cannot salami slice any more.
“We already have savings identified for the next two years so there’s money in the bank but we have several million pounds still to find.”
Arbroath Independent David Fairweather said he doubted few around the table would welcome the budget.
“I’m not going to go against it but I’m particularly disappointed that the roads budget is being cut again by £905,000,” he said.
“That’s almost £2 million in two years and after this winter and the wet weather we have seen our roads are disintegrating. When the roads department saw this (budget) they must have been freaking out.”
Kirriemuir councillor Ronnie Proctor said: “Although it’s pretty dismal there is a silver lining behind this cloud because it will focus people’s minds on how we do business.”
There was a warning from Arbroath councillor Ewan Smith over the years beyond the three-year period the new budget strategy takes in.
“We are spending a lot of money and when we get into the later years there is next to nothing available,” Mr Smith said.
“We’re continually having to raid the revenue budget to pay for loans and as this new approach is all about need I’m not sure that all the items in the capital plan need to be done right now, but could wait for a few years until the economy is better and we are more able to afford them,” he said.
Mr King said: “Last year we looked very carefully at the capital plan and it was prioritised at that time.
“There still remains a considerable number of projects to be brought forward to the capital plan and that will be done when we can accommodate them.”
Angus Provost Helen Oswald, pictured left, said: “I am disappointed by many of the things we have had to do in this budget, but we can only work with what we have.”