B&NES Council needs to cut £35 million over the next four years
Bath and North East Somerset Council is expecting to cut more than 300 jobs and almost halve its office space in a bid to save at least £35 million over the next three to four years.
This year alone B&NES Council will lose £3.6 million of Government funding and is already making tough decisions about where the axe will fall.
Around a third of the cuts will be made in the children’s services department.
A spokeswoman for B&NES said these spending cuts were just the tip of the iceberg.
She said: “The ‘in year’ cuts are just the beginning and are less than a tenth of the total level of cuts that can be expected in the public sector over the next four years.
“The Council’s approach will be to make savings whilst minimising the impact on frontline services.
“However, tough decisions will have to be made and we expect to have to make 300 or more job losses over the next three to four years.”
B&NES has released more details about the exact amount of cuts to certain areas, with £1.6 million coming from children’s services.
The young people’s advice service Connexions will lose £50,000, resulting in “extensive redundancies”, meaning it will now only focus on the “most vulnerable” children.
There will also be a £118,600 loss of support for schools, meaning schools will now have to work more closely together rather than relying on local authority help in making improvements.
Children in deprived areas will lose out on subsidised and free travel to school because of a £63,000 grant loss.
This will be particularly harshly felt in the Twerton and Whiteway areas of the city if the proposed closure of Culverhay School goes ahead, meaning youngsters will have to travel further to school.
Capital spending for young people will also be reduced by more than £1.1 million, meaning plans for new diploma qualification and IT projects will have to go.
In other areas free swimming for the over-60s will finish and a decision will need to be made about where £600,000 worth of highways savings will come from.
The local authority business growth incentive scheme, which is designed to help local companies grow, will lose £185,000.
Meanwhile the future of the controversial Bath Transport Package, which includes the bus rapid transit and the Bathampton Park and Ride, looks uncertain after the Government announced a temporary freeze in capital spending.
The council also admitted that it was not sure what would happen about the Bath Western Riverside project and funding for local affordable housing schemes.
However a spokeswoman added: “There is the possibility that some of this capital funding will be released when more is known about Government future funding of the public sector as part of the comprehensive spending review announcement on the 20 October.
“This means that some of these capital schemes may still be able to proceed as originally envisaged or at a reduced level.”
B&NES said the Government had given its support for a council tax freeze and no public sector pay increases, apart from for the lowest paid staff.
For more details and reaction see this Thursday’s Chronicle.
54 Comments
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by Geezer, nahmeen?
Saturday, August 14 2010, 8:37AM
“Mr Hanney Guildhall, respect!
If money is your problem man, we can come to some arrangment. Bath is rich pickings with them sitting duck tourists, nah meen? Contact the firm.”
by johnbatheaston, Batheaston
Friday, August 13 2010, 11:13AM
“I repeat the questions you fail to answer
"You refer to "adult health and social services team which is expected to cost £130k and deliver £600k of savings per annum when completed." I hope this is successful but tell us who will carry the can if it costs £600k and delivers £130k and if they will be given a golden handshake for their endeavours?"
and
"The key to success is taking unnecessary steps out of the processes and staff involvement and engagement - together with a bit of management and leadership." What have your existing high paid "managers" and consultants been doing all this time then? Carrying on without a goal and without regard to costs and outcomes?"
Don't see your answers and I do not see "evidence". If I did perhaps I would accept your "(non) answers". Instead you keep fobbing us off. Or get the Chronicle to remove the thread perhaps?”
by Malcolm, Guildhall
Friday, August 13 2010, 9:57AM
“John Batheaston
I think you have had detailed answers to all the questions that you have raised. I accept you don't like the answers and that you don't accept the evidence provided. Not sure there is much else I can do.”
by Major Flack, Weston
Friday, August 13 2010, 9:22AM
“Indeed John, the councillor does indeed.”
by john, batheaston
Friday, August 13 2010, 9:11AM
“Mr Hanney still you don't answer the questions do you. A true politician. Whatever the question make the answer about something else and ignore what you have no answer for.”
by Malcolm, Guildhall
Thursday, August 12 2010, 6:21PM
“John Batheaston
The Council has generated £20m of efficiency savings over the last 5 years -reviewed by our auditors alongside value for money reviews as well on which we do pretty well. We will continue to seek to make efficiencies. One of the reason why we will get the level of efficiencies in health and social care is because of the strong and exemplar repeat exemplar partnership in place between the Council and the PCT which has been built over recent years. We are getting efficiencies across the public sector.
As an aside I have never suggested that we couldn't become more efficient. However, just to be clear there are plenty of inefficiencies in most private sector firms. The best organisations whether public or private look for continuous improvement and don't think that the identification of an efficiency means everybody who has gone before is useless.
Just as with the John Betty / Major Projects discussion the Council's track record is strong. We have delivered projects on time and on budget and when we 'invest to save' we do expect to get the savings - indeed we adjust the forward financial plan accodingly. So I expect the savings to be delivered and the plans and monitoring arrangements to be robust.”
by johnbatheaston, Batheaston
Thursday, August 12 2010, 4:59PM
“Mr Hanney, you talk about Lean Processes which means that looking back BANES had employed too many people doing too little work on too higher salaries. You refer to ¿adult health and social services team which is expected to cost £130k and deliver £600k of savings per annum when completed.¿ I hope this is successful but tell us who will carry the can if it costs £600k and delivers £130k and if they will be given a golden handshake for their endeavours? I assume there is a system of SMART analysis in place.
Added to this ¿The key to success is taking unnecessary steps out of the processes and staff involvement and engagement - together with a bit of management and leadership.¿ What have your existing high paid ¿managers¿ and consultants been doing all this time then? Carrying on without a goal and without regard to costs and outcomes?”
by Malcolm Hanney, Guildhall
Thursday, August 12 2010, 3:47PM
“Gary
With regard to borrowing, we had £80m in total at 31 March 2010 and funds on deposit of £38 million. i.e. a net borrowing of £42 million. This is perfectly affordable given the Council's annual expenditure and there is full provision for debt service costs in the annual budget. We didn't spend all the Council reserves nor have we borrowed without knowing how we are going to pay it back.
On the Bath Transport Package we are still looking to Government to fund. We also believe the Package is essential to future developments in Bath and the protection of value in the Council's Commercial Estate which is also very important to keep Council Taxes low etc.”
by Gary P, Bath
Thursday, August 12 2010, 12:18PM
“Some interesting and challenging views emerging on national politics and economics and the exchange between Viscount Vixley and Mandana only shows human beings rarely implement lessons from history. Though I don't agree with Dave's conclusion on destroying technology. Without it we all (Dave included) wouldn't be exchanging any of these ideas without ever having met.
New technology has also enabled me to be both a more efficient producer and have more time for other things, as opposed to having life dictated by the work. It could also be a logical answer to Bath's traffic problems, if only businesses would apply it to remove the 'nine-to-five' office commuting patterns that persist from the last century.
Which brings me back to more local politics/economics and wondering how does the B&NES cabinet member for resources think - "the last Government can be criticised for continuing to borrow and spend even at the times when they should have been putting money away" - squares against his council's apparent willingness to exploit these spending proclivities, in order to fund a multi-million pound transport scheme with no discernible or sustainable benefits for the people of Bath?”
by Viscount Vixley, Bath
Thursday, August 12 2010, 11:37AM
“Edit: (Should have read "I believe" that this Tory council etc etc). What a terrible slip up to make!!!”