First Minister to hear of funding concerns

PKC’s SNP leader set to highlight financial worries

Perth and Kinross Council’s SNP leader will write to Nicola Sturgeon “highlighting the massive real-terms cut to council funding” and its impact.

The majority of councillors - including the entire SNP group - also voted to call on the Scottish Government to pause rolling out the National Care Service and redirect the £1.7 billion funding into social care and preventative services across local government.

Both actions were approved as part of a Liberal Democrat amendment to an SNP motion on PKC’s revenue and capital budget update.

Council leader Grant Laing told councillors PKC was facing a “perfect storm on three fronts” as it faces an estimated £28 million funding gap over the next three years.

Councillors met for the last time this year on Wednesday, December 21, and considered an update on PKC’s revenue and capital budget.

Moving the paper for approval, Cllr Laing – one of the representatives for the Strathtay ward – said: “What we can all be certain of is that we are facing a perfect storm on three fronts.

“Firstly, we are seeing rising costs that are impacting both our revenue and our capital spend.

“Secondly, we are experiencing rising need and demand for the vital frontline services that our communities and citizens depend on.

“And, thirdly, we have inherited a structural deficit because tough decisions have not been taken in previous budgets.”

On December 15 Perthshire North MSP John Swinney – in his role as the Scottish Government’s interim finance secretary – announced an extra £550m in funding for Scotland’s councils.

But the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities’ “reality check” document calculated the increase to revenue funding as £498m with £427m of that ringfenced – leaving a £71m cash increase across Scotland’s 32 councils.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies said the budget was a “real-terms” cut to public services.

Conservative councillors Noah Khogali and Angus Forbes tabled an amendment asking the council to “recognise the very real impact that this unnecessary real terms cut will have on service delivery for the most needy in our area” and to “ask the leader of the council to write an open letter to the deputy first minister reminding him of the importance of the work that councils do, and asking him to reverse his large real terms cut”.

It was backed by both the Conservative and Labour groups but was out-voted by 24 votes to 16.

The Liberal Democrats, SNP and independents supported the SNP motion, which incorporated the Liberal Democrat amendment.

Tabling the amendment Liberal Democrat Perth City Centre councillor Peter Barrett said: “This budget settlement means another massive real-terms cut in councils’ core funding, after more than 10 years of real-terms cuts, and will lead to socially harmful cuts to vital local services, the loss of jobs within Perth and Kinross Council and for local companies that rely on Perth and Kinross Council for their employment.”

Cllr Barrett’s amendment called on the council to make a “robust public response to the budget statement, challenging in the strongest possible terms the presentation of the £550m as additional funding”.

It also asked: PKC to invite Mr Swinney to attend a special COSLA leaders’ meeting; Cllr Laing to write to Nicola Sturgeon “highlighting the massive real-terms cut to council funding” and its impact on “vital local services and on the most vulnerable in our communities”, and to request the Scottish Government “pause the current plans for structural change required to set up the National Care Service and to redirect the funding allocated within the Scottish budget into social care and preventative services through local government”.

Liberal Democrat councillor Liz Barrett seconded.

Elected members previously raised concerns about the proposed National Care Service as part of the local authority’s response to a consultation on the matter last year.