It has been another challenging year, and decisions from central government continue to put significant pressure on budgetary planning. Inevitably this is leading to local tax rises, but the council also needs to ensure it’s using all the powers at its disposal to support its revenue in ways which are fair and aligned with key objectives.
Covid-19 continues to be a significant factor impacting the budget and obviously needs to be addressed, but it mustn’t be allowed to overshadow the bigger strategic issue – that our climate and natural world are still deteriorating at a terrifying rate, and time to mitigate and adapt is running out. The council needs to recognise that we can’t wait to “finish” dealing with the pandemic first, it’ll be too late by then. While the council’s rhetoric around climate change has improved of late, we’re still way behind on action and another budget which doesn’t fund the necessary level of ambition is not viable at this late stage. If the council needs to borrow to make up ground, then borrow.
Households are facing a squeeze on cost of living, and together with Covid-19 and Climate Change, there are challenging times ahead. It’s important to recognise that while we’ll all be effected, we won’t all be impacted equally. The fight against inequality and poverty is central to these issues, and it is here that additional support will be needed to ensure resident’s wellbeing.
Improving services though alternative delivery methods is an opportunity to do things better and should be made the most of. Any changes however must be fair, considered, genuinely beneficial, and not just cover for service reduction to cut costs.
Perhaps a good place to start would how the council delivers consultations – this consultation has fallen significantly below the required standards. The people of North Tyneside deserve to see transparency and genuine impact from this consultation exercise – it’s not sufficient that it just ticks a box and everything else goes ahead regardless.
Calls for Action:
- Expand Council Tax Support Scheme so more people are suppported though the cost of living crisis.
- Review charges and introduce Green levies to make up the shortfall, linking tax to actions rather that circumstance.
- Acknowledge Climate Risk, plan for mitigation and adaptation, and introduce a Climate Change Reserve to protect the residents, businesses and environment from growing threats.
- Show real ambition and take bold decarbonisation action. Investment now will not only protect the environment, but save money in the long term.
- Prioritise promoting and enabling behaviour change – modest spend can have a huge impact, but time is of the essence.
- Deliver better, not just cheaper. Make sure fairness and equality are considered first in service reform.
- Involve the community in developing plans from the outset.