By Sarah Boyack
COUNCILS and local government budgets don’t often make for electrifying reading. However, the huge range of responsibilities councils are tasked with have a direct effect on everyone in Scotland. Ageing populations, social care, schools, childcare, poverty levels, employment, transport networks, emission targets and planning all come under the remit of local government, delivering services that are deeply interwoven through our lives. In other words, councils have a crucial leadership role in conducting the provision of day-to-day services but are now forced to do so with one hand tied behind their backs. And it all must be done whilst implementing new Scottish Government policies.
At our parliament’s local government committee evidence sessions, it’s been depressing to see the extent to which successive years of cuts have impacted on the capacity of our councils to maintain existing services. This year, the headline of £95 million added to local council budgets will enable those who have already set their budgets to take another look and potentially make marginally less cuts in a couple of areas. But the £95m is still £205m short of what is needed to provide services.
The sums make for stark reading. The reality is that over the last decade councils have received disproportionate levels of cuts from the Scottish Government whilst simultaneously facing a council tax freeze – a combination that saw councils making tough choices between services, and jobs slashed; 10,000 full-time equivalent jobs lost, or 33,000 people losing employment across Scotland.
The financial fall-out continues. In my council – the City of Edinburgh Council – alone, the bill to refurbish or build new schools to meet the needs of a growing population will be a staggering £570m. The council will need to borrow £260m to meet that and find an extra £17.5m annually in revenue spending. That converts into greater strains on education budgets and more stress for teachers. In the public sector, a TU Unison report revealed a disheartening figure, with 60 per cent of social workers actively seeking alternative employment due to cuts driving up workplace pressures.
Getting people to work, schools, colleges and universities is important, which is why free bus travel for under-25s was one of Scottish Labour ‘sasks in our budget negotiations. But although the SNP-Green bus pledge for young people made headlines last week, we’re not going to see the revolution we need in bus expansion. And the timid offer of looking at expanding free bus services to under-18s won’t be the transformation that Labour’s promise to deliver free bus travel for under-25s target would have delivered.
So I won’t be celebrating today when the Scottish budget is passed because I know that councils will be doing the only thing they can to get their budgets over the line: borrow more from reserves, cut community centres, leave potholes on our roads for a bit longer. All while raising council tax and charging for services such as music tuition or garden waste.
It’s clear our local councils don’t have the resources they need. In the long term, lack of investment in our communities ultimately costs us all more. It’s time for the UK Government to give Scotland more investment through the Barnett consequentials, and for the Scottish Government to pass on full additional resources to councils so that they can respond to community priorities. It is time for change. Not weak, SNP-driven short-term panaceas, but bold, transformative policies that will deliver real results.
Labour MSP Sarah Boyack is Shadow Local Government Spokesperson
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