The NEN – North Edinburgh News

‘Thinking needs to be done, not only in this city but across Scotland. This is the important missing element in this consultation.’

Granton and District Community Council has urged the city council to think again over proposed budget cuts. The community council’s response to the budget proposals follows a local consultation conducted by community councillors last week.

Community council secretary Dave Macnab said: “We have submitted this response to the city council on behalf of those who attended our local consultation exercise. When the people within our area found out scale of the cuts – for they are cuts, calling them savings is double speak – they were appalled.

We are calling on all councillors and in particular those who represent us in Forth to oppose the cuts. The council needs to think again.”

GDCC_December_Budget_response

Granton & District CC’s budget response reads:

Dear Sir/Madam,

City of Edinburgh Council – Budget Consultation 

1. Background 

1.1       As part of the Council ‘Budget Challenge’ consultation 2015/16 the Council outlines that it faces a budget challenge which ultimately means that “we need to save £67 million over the next three years”.  The main thrust of the consultation as far as we can see has been the encouragement of the citizens of Edinburgh to go ‘on line’ and ‘take the budget challenge’ which is an on line platform that encourages people to decide what services they want to cut.

1.2       Granton and District Community Council were not convinced that having an on line consultation exercise was sufficient to get the views of all of the people of Edinburgh given the scale of the cuts that are being proposed.  Whilst we acknowledge that there were a series of ‘drop in’ events for people across the city, the focus of these was on showing people how to view and work the budget ‘game’.

This means that people who do not have regular access to IT – often older residents and those who do not have access to IT –  will miss out on the opportunity to have their say.  It is our view that the scale of the proposed budget cuts will have a disproportionate and negative impact on these very people – often the poorest in our communities.  As a consequence we decided to undertake our own consultation exercise.

2. Granton and District Community Council – Consultation 

2.1       We organised a drop in day for Tuesday 9 December at Royston & Wardieburn Community Centre – we were in the centre from 9.30 – 6.30 pm.

2.2       To promote the event we distributed 2000 leaflets across our community council area that highlighted the purpose of the event etc.

2.3       We also placed posters across our community to advertise the event.  We also made full use of social media – including our web site and twitter account.

2.4       We drew up a list of some of the key proposals (that the council had identified in the consultation document) that we considered would have severe and negative impact within our area and asked people to comment on these – via post-its, voting stickers, and by talking to us.  We noted down what they said as well as have them write down their concerns. Not everyone used the ‘voting stickers’.

3. Outcome of the Consultation 

3.1       Despite the terrible weather conditions we had 52 people who spoke to us.  Every person we spoke to were “astonished”, “amazed”, “had no idea” of the scale of the cuts.

Clearly the on line budget consultation has not resulted in the people within our community having any idea of the scale or specifics of the cuts proposed and the impact on what this means in real terms. This was our fear and so it has been realised.  The real impact needs to be clearly articulated by the Council before any decisions are made.

3.2       The qualitative data is outlined in Appendix 1 

4. Consultation Conclusions and Recommendations 

4.1       It is clear that the council does not have enough income to deliver the services for the people it serves. Yet nowhere do we see that there has been any thinking done to increase income.  The focus is on cutting services.  We believe this is a one dimensional approach.

4.2       We do not believe that sufficient impact assessment evidence has been produced to provide a clear socio-economic evaluation on most proposals.

4.3       We therefore call on the council to approach the Scottish Government with a view to obtaining additional grant funding to cover the services for the people of Edinburgh.  If the Scottish Government cannot provide this – then they in turn should be advised to approach the UK Government for emergency funding.

4.4       We believe this city is facing a funding crisis and moving money from one area to another is divisive and will not solve the fundamental issue which is insufficient income. Given the changing demographics and growth in overall population as the race to ever further house building continues, the pressure on the city infrastructure and public services is at breaking point. The squeeze on council finances will continue and people will continue to suffer. Therefore a more fundamental approach to local authority funding is needed and this thinking needs to be done, not only in this city but across Scotland.  This is the important missing element in this consultation.

4.5          We think it worth reminding the council and our elected representatives of a report of the Communities and Neighbourhood Committee of 24^th November that highlighted the levels of poverty and inequality across this city:

• Some 22% of all households in the city live on incomes below the poverty threshold, slightly above the Scottish average
• 24% of all Edinburgh households lived in fuel poverty in 2012. This equates to some 53,600 households in the city. 

4.6       There is an irony in that one of council actions to help deal with poverty and inequality as outlined in this report stated:

“Ways to improve neighbourhoods are crucial and include place making and building community capacity. Examples are given of community learning and development to help with basic skills and to support community organisations, advice work to help poor households retain stable accommodation, improving the insulation of homes to reduce fuel poverty, and community safety actions to make residents feel safer by reducing anti-social behaviour.

Whilst one of the council budget cut proposals is:

“Carry out a full service review of CLD reducing the level of staffing at all grades, realigning staff against emerging neighbourhood models of work, prioritising service…..there may be some reduction in community based programme…..”

Clearly these two things are contradictory.

4.7       We consider that the only way that our city will meet people’s aspirations in terms of reducing poverty and inequality is by way of a fairer, more progressive tax system. When you take account of direct and indirect taxes, those on low incomes in the UK are being hit hard, while billions of pounds each year is lost through tax avoidance and evasion (by the richest). Progressive tax reforms would help to address inequality at root as well as redistributing economic power.

4.8       There has been under-investment in public sector, in technology, in infrastructure, in education for years. It is enlightening to quote the words from Nobel Prize-winning economist Professor Joseph Stiglitz who served as Chairman of the Economic Advisors under President Bill Clinton and Chief Economist at the World Bank:

“One should remember austerity has almost never worked. This is an idea that’s been tried over and over again; back in 1929 Herbert Hoover tried it, succeeded in converting the stock market crash into the Great Depression – there were some other factors too. The IMF has tried this experiment; in East Asia I saw it in the years that I was at the World Bank; they tried it in Latin America; each time it succeeded in converting downturns into recessions, recessions into depressions”.

Whilst we recognise that these wider economic issues are not within the remit of the city council we make this statement as part of a wider debate that we consider needs to take place in Scotland and is the economic and social context in which the current cuts are being proposed.

4.9       We call on the council not to implement the current proposals. Everyone that we spoke to said no.  There was a strong view that the council have not thought hard or innovatively enough and do need to take a stronger step in supporting the people in rejecting the current economic paradigm and seek a new approach that supports the aspirations of the people of this city. We reject the budget proposals as currently outlined and call on our elected representatives within Forth and beyond to reject them.

Granton and District Community Council
http://grantonanddistrictcommunitycouncil.com/
Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/GrantonDistCC