Council set

Households are set for the first rise in a decade

Council tax is going up for all Monklands householders for the first time in a decade, but under-threat community centres and leisure facilities were reprieved as North Lanarkshire set its budget for the year ahead.

Both the Labour and SNP groups, along with independents, supported the three per cent rise in council tax – which will take the authority’s Band D bill to £1130.94 per year from the current level of £1098, in place since 2007.

The plan, which will generate an additional £4 million in revenue for the council, was passed 65-9 in Friday’s vote; the Conservative group had favoured a smaller rise of two per cent.

Council leader Jim Logue told the Advertiser: “After 10 years of a freeze, I think it was fairly important. The majority view in the group at all times was we were absolutely clear that we wouldn t move from the three per cent.

“If we hadn’t put council tax up, then we’d have had to find an extra £4m [of savings] above the £17m. You have to take a balanced perspective; this is a budget which delivers for communities.”

He added of the SNP’s agreement on the level of increase: “I didn’t know their budget or what they were coming to present, but three per cent was incorporated in all the financial assumptions from central government.”

North Lanarkshire’s £757m budget was passed 44-31 after a three-hour debate, with Labour’s saving and spending proposals being backed by the Conservative and independent members, while the SNP proposed their own revised financial options.

The £2.6m of cuts approved include the closure of Drumpellier plant nursery, while 89 full-time equivalent posts will be lost as the council balanced its books for the year ahead.

Councillors voted to “externalise the supply of plants and floral features” to save £105,000, resulting in the closure of the Coatbridge nursery complex.

Also included is reducing devolved school management budgets – for absence cover, administration and procurement of supplies and services