The budget: one of the most important decisions councillors make

THIS EVENING (Wednesday), the Council will consider Labour’s proposed budget for the forthcoming year. Setting the budget is one of the most important decisions we make as councillors, but it’s also one of the most difficult.

Inevitably, we cannot do everything that we would like to.

This is especially true while the effects of the pandemic are still being felt, supplementing the inherent challenge posed by more than a decade of underfunding by national Government.

Budgets in challenging circumstances become a challenge of priorities – what’s the balance to be struck between the services we must protect and the areas in which we need to further invest?

And speaking of balance, the

Council’s budget must, by law, financially balance every single year.

We cannot rely on deficit spending as, for example, NHS trusts can.

Accordingly, our budget proposals weigh the need for major investments in better facilities for residents and the need for continued savings and more efficient ways of working, all the while protecting the valuable council services that I know local people value and rely on.

We are proposing a 1.99% Council Tax increase and 1% Adult Social Care precept in Reading this year – the lowest rise for a number of years.

The vast majority of properties in Reading sit in band C or below and the rise, which is below inflation, means a 91p a week increase in the Council’s element for band C homes. We’ve also enhanced our local Council Tax

Support Scheme for those on low incomes.

Recognising the pressure that the pandemic continues to place on the care system, we are making £5 million of additional funding available for essential adult social care services. We see this as essential since so many residents rely on our services and, throughout the pandemic, the NHS could not have done its work if our social care teams hadn’t done theirs. Moreover, the Government’s solution to the care funding crisis – hiking National Insurance contributions by over 10% from April – is frontloaded to go to hard-pressed NHS colleagues before it reaches councils like ours.

We also acknowledge the need to ensure everyone can share in Reading’s success. We’re proposing funding for a new programme of work to tackle economic inequalities in our town alongside new apprenticeships across the Council so that we can be an exemplar for other employers to follow.

We are making more funding available for Reading’s incredible voluntary sector who have the skills and experience to reach and support people in our communities, including by doubling the size of our oversubscribed annual small grants pot.

We’ve also made provision for a scheme of free doorstep bulky waste collections, something many residents have asked for.

And then there are the bigticket investments, the things most residents will probably be especially keen to hear about. £8 million more on new road surfaces (building on Reading’s biggest ever £9m road repair programme which, on its own, will see 436 residential roads resurfaced); £40 million on leisure facilities, with Palmer Park’s new community pool open by the end of this year and Rivermead’s new competition pool and brand-new leisure facilities opening in spring 2023; £20 million on the new Green Park Station, also opening this year, and a complete refurbishment of Reading West Station; £88 million on more than 300 new affordable homes and another £34 million on low carbon measures up to 2030 to improve energy efficiency in all our Council housing stock; and continuing with a £7m programme investment in low carbon energy measures over the next three years as we all work towards Reading’s 2030 net-zero carbon target.

When I look at how far we’ve come in the past few years, I’m really pleased with the financial stability we’ve achieved at the Council.

I’m also pleased that, once again, we can bring forward a budget that gets the balance right in ensuring front-line services are enhanced while also allowing us to invest in Reading’s future.

I look forward to seeing the fruits of this over the next

12 months.

Cllr Jason Brock is the leader of Reading Borough Council, and Labour ward member for

Southcote