In my previous February Council Watch blog, I inferred that the meeting was quite passionate, at least, many of the participants, on both sides, spoke with passion. Primarily, it was a return to good old-fashioned political posturing, some heckling, and not a few metaphorical clenched fists were waved!
The meeting last week was primarily held to agree the Draft Corporate Plan, the revised Budget for 2014/15 and the Budget for 2015/16, and the Treasury Management and Investment Strategy. As I said before, all were agreed on by a majority, but not by all: 23 Labour for and 8 Conservative abstentions in each case, though the Investment Strategy was agreed unopposed. Interestingly, at the previous Budget Cabinet on 16th February, which has 6 Labour and 2 Conservative members, 1 of the Conservatives was absent, and the other agreed with the rest to recommend to the Full Council that the Plan and Budget be approved...
When introducing the Budget, the Council Leader explained that the balanced budget was necessary to ensure the funding of the Corporate Plan, despite Hastings Borough Council having a reduction of 54% in its grant from Central Government to 2016/17, and allowing for inflation, effectively a 60% cut, that is more than any other council in the South East. There would be redundancies, some cuts in services, Council Tax and parking fee increases, essentially, though, the plan would be enabled.
The Opposition introduced amendments to the Plan and Budget, but they fell without a majority in each case, only receiving their own 8 votes. Indeed, a few councillors asked why had the Opposition suggestions suddenly appeared and not been brought up at appropriate previous meetings, so they could be considered before the Plan and Budget were put to the Full Council. There was quite a bit of forceful language, some badinage, and a few witty quotes came from both sides, certainly it wasn't a boring meeting.
What will interest most residents of Hastings is that the Council agreed to raise the Council Tax in Hastings by 1.9%. When taking into account the increase I've previously discussed of East Sussex County Council, and increases from the Police and Fire services, the average increase to households in Hastings will be 1.95% for 2015/16.
