Budget day in EastRen

Council tax is likely to be frozen in East Renfrewshire when councillors meet to plug a budget black hole of almost £12 million today, writes Local Democracy Reporter Drew Sandelands.

School cleaners, janitors and crossing patrollers’ jobs are being removed as part of a package of cuts agreed back in December – and £800,000 of savings could still need to be found.

Political parties are set to present their own plans to deal with the shortfall for 2024/25 when they meet at 10am but options set out by officials show around £3.2m would be available from the Scottish Government to cover the council tax freeze.

They also reveal the gap could be reduced further through the use of £5m from‘reprofiling’of PFI payments – deals which saw private sector investment in public infrastructure projects, such as schools and roads.

That would leave a £3.8m deficit which officials suggest could be covered by £3.1m of savings and £700,000 from reserves.

Councillors agreed cuts of £2.2m in December – leaving £900,000 new savings required under that proposal.

The savings plans would see around 60 full-time equivalent jobs lost across the local authority but leader Owen O’Donnell, Labour, said there would be no compulsory redundancies.

He added most of the job losses would be due to “vacancies”.

Speaking ahead of the budget meeting this morning, Cllr O’Donnell said the council tax freeze was the“wrong policy measure”and benefits “those in larger properties at the expense of those most in need”.

However, he added ignoring the funding for the freeze would be “difficult to justify”.

The council leader described council tax as “one of the most important levers” available to local authorities, and the freeze as“not fully funded as claimed”– with officials reporting it is the equivalent of a 4.66 per cent rise despite ministers promising five per cent.

He pointed out that residents will still see their bills rise as water charges, set by Scottish Water, will go up by 8.8 per cent from the start of April.

East Renfrewshire will receive a settlement of around £239m from the Scottish Government for 2024/25.