No more cuts to jobs and services

Invite to a meeting

The North Edinburgh and East Edinburgh Save Our Services campaigns are calling an online meeting on Thursday 10th September at 6.30pm.  The meeting will discuss how to mobilise opposition to the latest round of cuts in jobs and services. 

Register at

https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0oceirrD0uGt0TO6s_SIKPshqmgVQVCeC4

It is time to end the cycle of cuts to vital local services in our city.  Austerity, outsourcing and privatisation has been pushed down from Westminster via Holyrood and implemented by the City Council for too long.  But we need a powerful campaign if we are to be successful.  

Since 2012/13, Edinburgh City Council budget cuts have amounted to £320 million. Prior to Covid19 the estimate was that there would be further cuts of £87.3 million by 2023. 

These cuts have had a terrible effect on essential services.  The most vulnerable, who have also been hit by cuts in social security benefits, have suffered most. Edinburgh has the lowest expenditure per capita on local services in Scotland.

The City Council’s press releases fail to reflect the reality of life for many of Edinburgh’s citizens.  Wrapped in the language of ‘savings’, ‘inclusion’, ‘progress’, ‘just recovery’ and ‘sustainability’, they accept that there is no alternative to an ideology that supports a relentless increase in inequality.

Covid19 has added to an already bleak picture with increases in unemployment, child poverty and mental distress.  The pandemic has shone a harsh light on the gaps in local services and underlined the importance of key workers and health, social care, housing and education.  

Edinburgh Council argues that falling revenues and increased costs as a result of Covid19 now mean that further cuts are required.  The Edinburgh Integration Joint Board, through which the Council and the NHS administer integrated health and social care, has already agreed cuts of £8 million.  

We understand that proposals for cuts will go the Finance Committee on 24th September and be considered at the full Council meeting on 15th October.

These cuts affect individuals, groups and organisations across the city.  They will further erode essential services and add to the numbers of unemployed.

The annual cuts in jobs and services that have taken place over the last decade have not gone unopposed.  On occasion we’ve been able to deflect specific measures.  But each year the screw has tightened.  

It is not true that there is no money to fund these services. The Westminster government is choosing to direct it to the big corporations.  For example, eleven billion pounds have gone to the private sector for a track and trace system in England that doesn’t work.  £600m was handed to Tesco in rate relief (that went straight to their shareholders) while the company is enjoying a sales bonanza.

This meeting can be a first step in building a mass campaign for social justice, push back the cuts and fight for public services. 

If our elected politicians wish to truly represent us, then they should join the campaign.  If not, they should step aside. Let’s save and rebuild services, save jobs and fight for social justice and an environmentally sustainable future.

Lifeline for threatened projects? It’s too soon to celebrate

The North Edinburgh Save Our Services campaign are holding an Action Meeting on Wednesday evening – and there may be some good news at last for the six local community projects whose Health and Social Care funding was slashed by the Edinburgh Integration Joint Board last December. Continue reading Lifeline for threatened projects? It’s too soon to celebrate

Silent Slaughter: Community groups and Trade Unions urge council cuts rethink

Capital Coalition poised to slash city services by more than £34 million 

Campaigners from North Edinburgh Save Our Services and representatives from Edinburgh Tenants Federation will appeal to city councillors to draw back from making swingeing cuts to council services across the city when they speak at  deputations to the City Council’s Budget meeting on Thursday. Continue reading Silent Slaughter: Community groups and Trade Unions urge council cuts rethink

North Edinburgh Save our Services: Action Meeting tonight

ACTION MEETING

Tonight at The Prentice Centre, 6 – 8pm

All Welcome Continue reading North Edinburgh Save our Services: Action Meeting tonight

“You might as well build an abbattoir at the top of Pennywell Road: we’re being put to the sword”

Funding Cuts: When all else fails, order a report … or two

Campaigners representing local community organisations affected by impending cuts to Health and Social Care grants put their case for continued funding to the North West Localities Committee last week.

The projects were told that the Locality Committee is in no position to restore lost funding, however, and councillors committed only to call for reports into the EIJB’s grant funding process.

In particular, officers were tasked to look at activity (or lack of it) to support projects affected by discontinued funding since the decision was made in December. The reports will also analyse the funding spend to determine whether or not North West has been impacted more severely than other localities.

While it’s important that lessons are learned for the future, this action won’t help those projects who need support NOW, though: the Localities committee doesn’t meet again until 28th March – by which time projects will have had to issue redundancy notices to staff and, in some cases, look at closing projects down. Continue reading “You might as well build an abbattoir at the top of Pennywell Road: we’re being put to the sword”