Council agrees £10.5m budget cuts

Rochdale Council has rubber stamped a £10.5m cuts package.

The cuts were approved by Councillors as they set their budget for 2012/13.

The budget – which includes a Council Tax freeze – could see a net reduction of 150-200 jobs.
 
The Council says that “every effort” will be made to ensure that staffing reductions, where possible, will be achieved through “voluntary measures” including opportunities for suitable offers of alternative employment within the Council, but “compulsory redundancies may be unavoidable.”
 
The closure of the Ronald Gorton Centre, the relocation of Customer Service Centres into libraries, the introduction of charges for bulky waste and a reduction in opening hours at Hollingworth Lake Visitor Centre are some of the measures that were approved.
 
Cuts approved include:

• Reducing staff and budgets in Human Resources, Legal, Finance, Performance and Transformation - leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 of £2,878,000
• The closure of the Ronald Gorton Centre – leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 of £94,100
• Reduction in provision of street services including street cleaning, cutting grass and litter picking - leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 of £500,000
• Moving customer services in Rochdale, Heywood, Milnrow and Middleton into libraries in those places - leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 £464,300
• Ending the automatic provision of transport for people to access adult social care services – leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 £125,000
• Reshaping services within the Youth Offending Team - leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 of £60,000
• Internal Library Re-structure and one year reduction to the book fund - leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 of £200,000
• Reducing the budgets for running costs of 16 children’s centres by £2,000 each - leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 £32,000
• Reducing operational commissioning budget for business, employment and skills by 44 per cent - leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 of £447,200
• Reducing the grant to Rochdale Town Centre Management Company - leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 of £11,300
• Reducing the use of external fostering placements - leading to a full year saving for 2012/13 of £885,000

Budget amendments were put forward by both the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats.

The Conservative recommendations included reviewing the Corporate Complaints Team, withdrawing funding for Trade Unions and investing in Community Centres.

The Liberal Democrats proposed to re-establish 27 emergency homeless beds, create a Community Fundraising Post and remove two senior managers posts from the Youth Service.

None of the amendments were approved.

However, Council Leader, Colin Lambert, said he would like to look further at the proposals for a review of the Corporate Complaints Team and Public Relations Marketing.

Councillor Peter Williams, Deputy Leader of the Labour group, said that the alternative proposals do not “meet the challenge” set by the Government.
Presenting the Labour council’s budget, leader Councillor Colin Lambert said: “The papers presented to you represent many months of hard work and some very tough decision making.

“The outcome is a number of budget recommendations that I believe ensure the council’s financial position is robust and will support us through the next year of 2012/13.

“It is going to be a difficult year and many challenges will face us going forward to facilitate early consideration of the funding for 2013/14 and 2014/15.”

He added: “Any budget at anytime is not without a risk, a budget when there is so many uncertainties from central government and when demand for services is likely to increase will make it harder to achieve a balanced budget

“We believe we have done so and believe will do so in coming years.”

He added: “We have achieved the budget with plans to improve value for money and deliver £10.5million in savings, whilst not increasing the council tax.