The Swindon Labour Group proposed reallocating £2.25m of Council resources to Labour priority areas at the Thursday 25th February Swindon Full Council Meeting. At this meeting Councillors will be setting Swindon Council’s budget for 2016/17. Please find the amendment attached.
The Swindon Labour Group Leader, Councillor Jim Grant, said:
“If approved this Labour amendment would save libraries from threat of closure, it would save Swindon’s Children’s Centres from threat of closure and will avoid Lydiard being transferred to the private sector. We are also proposing to keep open the Euclid Street Children’s Nursery which is popular amongst local parents and toddlers, is rated as Good by Ofsted and makes the Council a profit.
The principle behind this amendment is making sure Swindon Council is spending the money it has available on the services people most need and value. The fact is with government funding cuts to councils all council services have fallen under scrutiny for cuts, particularly non-statutory services. But wherever we can the Council should be focussing its resources on important and valued assets and services and Labour’s budget amendment does that.
In order to save essential services we have had to make some tactical back-office savings elsewhere. But bringing Forward Swindon in-house, reforming the Localities team to make it a community engagement unit rather than a research department, and using modern technology to make the local authority a truly paperless council, are measures we can make to focus on residents’ priorities.
This budget amendment even raises the funds for a local referendum on whether to parish the non-parished areas of Swindon, which we know the Tory Council wishes to do in order to raise council-tax by dramatic amounts through the back-door.”