Wolverhampton council reveals new £15.5m cuts within two years
More council cuts are looming as Wolverhampton council revealed it still has to find £15.5 million of savings within the next two years.
The cash-strapped authority has already had to make cuts of £200m in the last seven years and more is yet to come with crunch talks to be held over the summer about where the axe will fall next.
Council leaders are desperate not to have to dip into its £10m crisis fund in case of emergencies. And leaders say they do not want to touch areas like children’s services either. But it is in a race against time as needs to show how it will save £2.3m of the total before this October.
But Conservative group leader Wendy Thompson said the authority needs to be careful where it makes its savings saying: “So far the council has made considerable savings and they have also sold off an awful lot of council properties.
“That has raised quite a bit of money for them and I think they will be looking to do more of that over time.
“But they need to be very careful what decisions they make [in order to find savings].
“If they make the wrong decisions then quite reasonably residents will be unhappy.
“And if the residents are not happy with something then we will certainly be asking a lot of extra questions.”
The news comes despite the council selling off some of its buildings and revealing huge income from areas like bus lane cameras.
Back-to-back bus lane cameras in Victoria Square in Wolverhampton city centre, monitoring Pipers Row and Lichfield Street,were revealed as the second most lucrative in the country raking in £4,789 a day in fines earlier this year.
But councillor Andrew Johnson, cabinet member for resources, said money from the cameras and other highways fines could not be used for savings as it is ringfenced to be put back into highways.
He said: “In the climate of austerity and budget constraints, we have made budget cuts of £200m over the last seven years.
“The savings still needs to be achieved in the two years up to 2019/20.
“We still have budget restraints to achieve by 2018/19 with £2.3m of savings to be found by October this year.
“It is a testimony to the successful financial management of the council that we have not touched the contingency fund.
“I believe we have extremely well managed finances which has been supported by a recent external review.”
On the savings still to be found, Councillor Johnson added: “One area we wouldn’t look at making savings because of the growing pressures on it is adult services.
“We have actually put extra money into that because we have had money from the Government.
“Another area we are extremely cautious about is Children’s’ Services. We have managed to safely bring down the number of looked after children and have made big savings there but we would be worried about further savings as it has got to be done in a safe way.
“The public health budget is still ring-fenced currently. The same goes for money coming from fines in highways which has to go back in that area.”
He added: "£15.5 million is part of ongoing savings that we need to find over the next two budgetary years.
"This year we have to save 14.8 million, £2.3 million of which we need to identify by October before we go out to consultation.
"The biggest problem is the £15.5 million."
The news comes as in March this year it was announced that residents in the city were to see a 3.99 per cent council tax hike as well as £13.5m cuts to bin collections, car parks and roads as well as other services.
The rise in tax was approved as part of the budget proposals for 2017/18.
The tax increase was revealed however to be the lowest of all Black Country authorities.
Neighbouring cash-strapped authorities in Walsall, Dudley and Sandwell all put their council tax up by 4.99 per cent.
