Bristol’s ‘hard choices’ budget

In these “dark times” for local Government, Bristol’s Labour-led council has passed a budget with £34.5m of ‘savings’ that opposition parties say will hit front-line services.

The administration argues it has protected the city’s most vulnerable people, cut costs internally and introduced a raft of revenue-raising schemes, while trying to balance the books in the midst of Tory-imposed austerity.

Savings are needed to plug the council’s expected £108m gap by 2023.

But Labour councillor Jo Sergeant admitted it was with a heavy heart that she added her support to the 2018/19 budget, which will see the withdrawal of PCSO funding, the reintroduction of Sunday parking charges and a five per cent council tax rise.

People in the public gallery held up a banner protesting against any further cuts

Compared to last year’s controversial affair that imposed more than £100m worth of cuts on the city, Labour’s second budget passed with relative ease on Tuesday in a meeting that was predictably fraught with animosity.

The ruling party failed to get the backing of the Tory, Lib Dem, or Green groups, despite agreeing three of the four amendments put forward by the latter.

Mayor Marvin Rees says the council must balance the books

Addressing councillors in City Hall, mayor Marvin Rees said he understood the feeling against austerity, but argued that the surest way to let down the most vulnerable people would be to not balance the budget and be taken over by “bureaucrats sent down from Westminster”.

A Lib Dem amendment to take £50m worth of contingency borrowing money, set aside over five years, and put it towards investment in libraries, parks and adult social care gained support from the Tory and Green groups.

Anthony Negus says this is an opportunity to do things differently

Tim Kent, councillor for Hengrove and Whitchurch Park, proposed the amendment. It was seconded by Anthony Negus, representative for Cotham, who said: “The people that are going to be most hit here are the ones that are most disadvantaged in our society.

“This is a real opportunity to look big and do something about it.”

But Afzal Shah, Labour councillor for Easton, slammed the proposal as irresponsible and called on the Lib Dems to explain where this “magical money tree is going to come from”.

The Greens were granted a better reception, with cross-party support for three of their proposals.

The first was a simple plan put forward by Carla Denyer, councillor for Clifton Down, to raise the cost of skips and scaffold permits for private property developers, saving £100,000 per year, to be reinvested in the Crisis Prevention Fund, to help those most in need.

The second, proposed by Green group leader Eleanor Combley, will take £800,000 from the capital contingency budget and invest it in the purchase and refurbishment of two smaller children’s homes and was praised by all parties as the right thing to do.

Clive Stevens, councillor for Clifton Down, outlined the proposal to use £25,000 to pay a planner to assess and gather evidence on the impacts on university expansion – something he said could “pay back a thousand fold”.

While this measure was welcomed on all sides, the Greens were slammed for their proposal to remove councillor’s parking “perks”, with others accusing them of being out of touch, and the amendment was rejected.

The short shrift handed out to the Green group was minor compared to the fire directed at the Tories for their amendments.

Claire Hiscott, Conservative councillor for Horfield, acknowledged that times are tough in local government, but said that sometimes running a council is about making “unpalatable decisions” as she argued the administration needs to refocus its priorities.

She outlined the group’s amendment that included closing the council’s Brussels office to save £78,000, cutting £810,000 from PR and consultation spending and scrapping the City Poet to save an additional £5,000.

Bristol’s new City Poet Vanessa Kisuule

They also proposed introducing a mandatory council tax charge for all working households, a plan that Labour did a U-turn over in 2017 and said they would plough savings back into libraries, parks and PCSOs.

Paula O’Rourke, Green councillor for Clifton, called the measures a “dispiriting, mean little package” and – in support of the cultural value brought by the city poet – read out a limerick in opposition to the “short-sighted” proposals.

Summarising the final budget, Gill Kirk, Labour councillor for Lockleaze, said: “We understand how important things like the public toilets are to our city and some of the choices we have made have been very hard.

“If we had paid to bring all the outdated council toilet buildings up to standard this would have prevented us from making other investments.

“These are just come of the examples, but I just think it is important to bear these wider issues in mind when they consider this budget.”

Mark Weston extended an olive branch to council colleagues

Each of the other main parties said they were unable to support the budget.

Tory group leader Mark Weston claimed elements – including plans to make parks more self-funding – are unworkable, although he did extend an olive branch and said it’s time for parties to focus on what they do agree on.

Thanks to Labour’s convincing majority, the budget passed despite the opposition.

Speaking after the meeting, deputy mayor Craig Cheney, the council’s cabinet member for finance, said: “Despite the Government continuing to force up council tax and hit local people for it’s owns failings in dealing with the social care crisis, we have worked incredibly hard this year to limit it’s impact on Bristol.”

It will come into effect from April 1.

Read more: Flare set off in council meeting