05 November 2007
The publication of the draft budget by the Assembly Government and the derisory 2.2% increase for local government again shows that key public services have fallen off the radar of devolved government.
The 2.2% rise for local government represents a cut in finances, it fails to adequately cover inflationary pressures and will lead to service cuts, job losses across councils and intense pressures on the council tax.
Responding to today’s announcement Cllr Derek Vaughan (Neath Port Talbot), WLGA Leader said:
“Today’s settlement again sees local government at the bottom of the pile when it comes to public finances in Wales. We expected a tough settlement but today’s unacceptable outcome following on from the recent poor Comprehensive Spending Review will place huge pressures on local authorities who are already squeezing everything possible from the system.”
“In this climate the Assembly Government must prioritise and inject realism in its thinking about what local authorities can achieve, in particular it needs to scale down its own expectations around costly new initiatives.”
“Today’s budget confirms the WLGA’s recent analysis which shows that since devolution local government’s settlement budget increases have not matched the Assembly Government's total budget increase. Since 2000/01, local government funding has increased by 49% compared with an Assembly Government total budget increase of 81% and 86% for the NHS. What this means is that in the same period local government’s share of the total budget has fallen from 33% to 27%. On average, each year the real growth in local government's dedicated expenditure has been around 1% less that the real growth in WAG total expenditure.”
Cllr Meryl Gravell (Carmarthenshire), WLGA Presiding Officer added:
“This is by far the worst settlement under the Assembly government. The list of service pressures facing Welsh councils is huge and growing in scale. Sadly, it appears that local authorities again bear of the brunt of a terrible settlement. Every local authority wants to protect the local services within their community from schools, care services for older people, waste management services, improve the quality of social housing and ensuring that affordable housing is available. However, from today’s budget it is clear that our public messages of concern have gone completely unheeded. The WLGA has called for an urgent meeting with the Assembly Government to discuss our concerns and to call for a rethink before the final budget is published next year.”
Addressing what the Assembly Government’s draft budget means in practice for local government in Wales, the WLGA highlighted:
- An increasing funding gap between schools expenditure in Wales and England with average per pupil spend in Wales at £4,757 over £600 lower than per pupil spend in England;
- The continued contradictions of a Welsh Assembly government drive for service efficiencies such as the closure of small schools which are then opposed by Assembly members at the locality level;
- Social services remaining the "poor relation" when it comes to an holistic approach to health care with the focus on hospitals and not care in the community;
- Real difficulties in meeting a range of current commitments across the system, for example the Foundation stage in Education alone will have hugely significant costs;
- The growing impact on our services of increased migration into Wales with a range of new service challenges.
Ends
For more information contact: Natasha Weeks