Rochdale Council could be hit by shortfall

Councils across the country may have to cut jobs and services in the next few months in order to meet a £1 billion deficit caused by the credit crunch.

The Local Government Association has announced that inflation alone will create create a £500million shortfall in each of the next three years.

Rochdale Council was given a three-year budget last April which was based on a 2.7% inflation rate. The current level of inflation is 4.7%

Councils are already having to spend more on fuel and on school food, while service charges are falling as the housing market continues to fall. Subsidies to bus companies have also gone up.

The Head of the Local Government Association, Margaret Eaton said that rising costs and inflation were hitting town halls badly: "As the hard financial times bite, local councils are having to tighten their belts in exactly the same way that hard-pressed families are."

Despite Councils tightening their belts across the country, Rochdale’s Labour Parliamentary Candidate, Simon Danczuk, has urged Rochdale council to do more to protect the local economy and keep jobs in the town.

He said: "People in Rochdale are not interested in gazing at far away horizons; they’re looking at the present situation and wondering why the Council cannot make it an immediate priority to protect existing jobs and create new ones now.

"Generously salaried senior council officers and senior executives at Rochdale Development Agency might well be immune from the credit crunch. But many thousands of people aren’t and our senior public servants need to start acting in the best interests of Rochdale.”

Rochdale Councillor Farooq Ahmed, a local businessman himself, also expressed his concerns at the Council’s anti-business stance, warning that a lack of support for small businesses would result in more empty shops and job losses in the coming months.

“I honestly think that if our council had devoted half as much time to supporting entrepreneurs as it has spent on mishandling the ongoing town centre regeneration farce, which has seen over £100,000 wasted on one selection process already and made zero progress in the past year, then we would be in far better shape,” he argued.

“Is it too much to ask that our council looks to protect existing businesses by using the powers they have to provide hardship and small business rate relief?” he asked. “Could they not also be encouraging new start-ups by investing in business support services, making disused council land and buildings available for business use and creating an alternative market adjacent to the Town Hall? Our Council could be a lot more supportive to business if it wanted to.

“For too long the regeneration debate in Rochdale has focused on the mid to long term. In the current economic climate it is surely time for the council to be clear on what they’re able to do to stimulate our local economy in the short term.”