Councillors to vote on cuts and fee hikes

SWEEPING budget savings, which councillors will vote on today, could lead to an increase in disease outbreaks, reduced consumer protection and debt counselling, and could increase a fee by 520 per cent, according to a council report.

Argyll and Bute Council decides today (Thursday February 22) whether to adopt a new budget, which includes savings totalling £5,673,100 over 2018-21, and also cutting 36 jobs.

‘Service redesigns’ across departments strive to reduce costs, as well as increase charges to maximise income generation, and ‘stop doing work that is not a duty of a council’.

Staff reductions in Trading Standards would save £80,000 over three years, but also pose ‘a higher risk to consumer protection and greater level of non-compliance in [the] business sector’.

Funding would be reduced to the Citizens’ Advice Bureau, ‘with the introduction of in-kind support to offset these savings’. But, the report warns, ‘removing/ reducing our capacity to undertake debt counselling will reduce services to the vulnerable and, although they will have access to services through advice agencies or private contractors, these may be less accessible or may incur fees’.

More car parking charges would be introduced where demand is high, at £1 per hour off-street and £1.20 per hour on-street. The 39 council-owned piers and harbours could also see an above-inflation rise in fees.

Food export certificates could also jump 520 per cent from £17.50 to £91: ‘The council’s fee is the lowest in Scotland at £17.50 per certificate and does not recover our costs and diverts resources from other planned statutory work.

‘The proposed increase of £73.50 per certificate is not significant against the market value of the consignments (predominantly salmon, whisky, shellfish) which are being exported.’

Officers identified a ‘reputational risk of the council not being considered to be business friendly’.

The council could also reduce the £737,000 budget for its three airports in Oban, Coll and Tiree when a fixed sum contract is tendered, dropping over three years from £667,000 to £597,000 to £527,000, providing a ‘level of timetable that could be afforded’.