£27m savings on council agenda

Council leader Jim Logue says the local authority will have to find savings of £27million as members meet tomorrow to set the budget for 2017-2018.

Among the decisions will be whether to increase council tax following the end of the Scottish Government freeze.

Householders in the top four bands, E-H, will already see their bills increase after national changes to the tax’s basic “multiplier”; but local authorities now also have the power to increase the charge by up to three per cent.

Eleven of the first 14 councils to set their budgets have taken up that option; Aberdeenshire imposed an increase of 2.5 per cent and only South Lanarkshire and Renfrewshire have maintained a voluntary freeze.

The budget savings figure is lower than the £34.5m anticipated following December’s first draft of the Scottish budget – but Councillor Logue told the Advertiser: “A reduction to a cut is still a cut.”

North Lanarkshire was allocated £ 9.9m of the further £ 160m to North Lanarkshire.

“What’s happened is that the government has reduced the size of the cut to £27m – that’s a fundamental difference and has to be highlighted.

“I’ve said that all I want is a fair deal for councils. This announcement doesn’t amount to that [but] is merely slightly less unfair. I will always do my utmost to protect vital services.”

Finance secretary Derek Mackay told MSPs at Holyrood that his “latest assessment of the financial position and our projections for 2017/ 18 enabled me to identify resources to support additional spending”, adding that this would be “spent at the discretion of individual authorities”.

Fulton MacGregor, the Coatbridge and Chryston MSP, said the settlement was a “strong funding deal” and said that other parties had put forward “opposition for opposition’s sake”.

He said: “North Lanarkshire will benefit from a range of direct spending commitments.

“Labour, the Tories and the Lib Dems should think again before choosing to rob Monklands of these vital services in a narrow-minded campaign.”

Budget Councillors will meet tomorrow