More cuts on the cards
WESTMINSTER City Council is planning to make a further £14million cuts to services and jobs and will be introducing new and increased charges next year, according to latest cabinet report.
This latest round of cuts follows last month’s revelation that the council has a £20million hole in its budget, due largely to a £17million miscalculation in the council’s income from parking fines.
In July 2009 the council made nearly 300 staff redundant.
And in September 2008 the council revealed that £17million of council tax payers’ money had been invested in now-failed Icelandic banks. The full extent of the cuts and increased charges will be revealed in January.
To cope with the dire financial state of the council’s finances the Conservatives have already been increasing charges or introducing new ones, for example:
• the price of meals-on-wheels has been increased by almost 10 per cent (from £2.30p to £2.55p) and will cost elderly people an extra £91 a year;
• on December 1 a new £20 charge on residents was introduced to pay for the cost of the removal of bulky refuse;
• a £1-a-day tax has been introduced on all motorbike owners to park their bikes in Westminster – over a full year this amounts to a new tax of over £300;
• a new charge of £10 has been introduced on residents wanting to change their car parking details.
The Conservatives have brought the council to its knees with their financial incompetence, but the people who they expect to pay to clean up their mess are the poor and vulnerable who will have services cut and new charges imposed and council staff who will lose their jobs.
Residents simply can’t afford the Conservatives to lose another £17million next year by getting the council’s finances wrong yet again.
cllr Paul Dimoldenberg
Leader of the Labour Group