The Peterborough Evening Telegraph
Council leader calls on groups to ‘work together’
The Conservative leader of Peterborough City Council has called on opposition councillors to shoulder their share of responsibility for the local authority’s financial plight.
The impassioned plea comes from Councillor Wayne Fitzgerald who says he is frustrated by opposition councillors’ public criticism of the council’s proposed budget even though, he says, they have had a key say in putting the financial plan together.
His comments comes as the council is engaged in a desperate battle to stave off a Government takeover of the local authority as concern grows over a £27 million gulf in its finances.
The second phase of the budget for the next financial year proposes a Council Tax hike of 2.99 per cent and spending cuts of £12.6 million.
And Cllr Fitzgerald, who has served on the council since 2006 and took over as leader last year, said the eyes of Government officials were focused on all councillors and how they worked together to resolve the crisis.
He said: “Opposition councillors are not helping our cause with government when they are seen to be making political hay from the council’s financial position instead of all rowing together to sort it out.
“It leaves me puzzled and bemused as we are supposedly all in this together.”
Cllr Fitzgerald said: “Opposition councillors have as much input into the budget as I do.
“I’m very pleased that since I took over, I’ve got opposition groups around the table in the financial sustainable working group, where three members from each political group get an opportunity that they have never had before to formulate the budget from the get-go.
He said: “It is not politician that bring forward savings or efficiencies, these come from officers.
“What we have to do is decide which of those to take forward - but opposition parties are now at the same table when those decisions are now being made.
He added: “My challenge to the opposition is take collective responsibility for this budget. It is as much your budget as it is our budget, thus it is the council’s budget.”
The appeal for shared responsibility for the council’s financial woes is likely to surprise some after 22 years of Conservative Party rule on the city’s local authority.
But Cllr Fitzgerald said: “It is not true that it is all the Conservatives’ fault.
“The Conservatives have seen enormous growth in the city. We have managed the finances well. We have tried not to raise council tax in large chunks and not slashed and burned services.
“None of the opposition have called for increases in council tax and none of them have called for cuts to services but it comes a point where something has to give.”
Cllr Fitzgerald said over the last 10 years, Government had cut grants to the council by £55 million but that was during the ‘austerity’ years that had been forced on the nation by previous Labour governments.
But Cllr Fitzgerald also said he thought decisions by ruling Conservatives in previous years not to raise council tax - largely under pressure from former Communities Secretary Eric Pickles - had been a mistake.