Somerset Council cuts

[hermes2007]

I heard yesterday that the Community Area Partnership grant has been reduced by nearly half this year but no detailed Wiltshire Council announcements yet, but Somerset announced this morning.
Zero increase in council tax.
Debt currently £350m rising to £400m (predicted)
shortfall prediced to be £75m (equivalent to 5 new schools) over next 3 yrs
council jobs to fall by 1500 including compulsary redundancies
no more borrowing, therfore all major building projects cancelled
Libraries - hours reduced, Bruton closed - rest being reviewed and more voluntary libraries predicted
Major cuts to Arts budgets and council owned farms

Happy days!

[Yokel1]

Theres a lot of  spin there though - £75m is only equivalent to 5 new schools if 5 new schools are being planned, then shelved.
£75m could also be equivalent to the amount of administrative waste caused by (eg) employing 1500 too many staff.

[hermes2007]

I find a certain personal irony in agreeing with Ed Balls - someone I always regarded as a thug when he was in power - that these cuts are too fast and too deep. It's not that I can't see that spending needs to be restrained but this will end up destroying services that I think will make life very difficult, mainly (this is a Tory led Govt after all) for the poorest and most vulnerable. Whether they had a worthwhile job or not, throwing 1500 tax and rate payers onto an almost impossible job market is hardly likely to make things better.

Still it was busy but warm and sunny in town and I could sip my coffee and watch Westbury life pass by for a while.

[Yokel1]

Yeah, more baby boomers, screw over the old and the young, so long as they are ok.

[hermes2007]

Will you stop having a go at us baby-boomers. It was great whilst it lasted.

[Yokel1]

Now we have to pay for it.  All that money spent on Arctic Roll and rubik's cubes had to come from soemwhere