Labour Claims Cuts not Due to Grant Reduction
after with meeting with the Minister for Local Government
Local Labour Councillors and MPs are denying Wandsworth Council claims that cuts such as the closure of Wandsworth Museum are not due to Central Government grant custs as the Council has claimed. After a meeting with the Local Government minister they are saying that the figures show that the Council could have saved the closed facilities if they hadn't kept the Council Tax low for electioneering reasons
Phil Woolas MP met the Battersea and Tooting MPs, Martin Linton and Sadiq Khan, and Wandsworth Labour Leader, Tony Belton, with Museum & Libraries Speaker, Rex Osborn (pictured right).
Mr Woolas told the MPs that Government Grant to Wandsworth had risen by 25.7% in real terms since 1997 but that Wandsworth’s Council Tax had fallen by 11.2%.
He explained to the Councillors and MPs that the Government “expects council tax increases in England to be less than 5%”.
Mr Woolas added that “to be capped, the council tax increase would have to be above 5% AND there would have to be an excessive budget requirement increase.”
A budget increase of 6% was the target last year and Wandsworth’s budget increase was only 3%.
Cllr Tony Belton pictured left pointed out that according to the Council’s own Budget paper (07-228, paragraph 18) Wandsworth also gets the benefit of £41.1 million so-called damping grant – which if the Council did not receive it, would lead to a 75% hike in Council Tax.
So, far from being over generous to “our friends in the North” as the Tories claim, it is other authorities, who are subsidising Wandsworth’s low Council Tax. The Director of Finance’s very own paper says that grant entitlements to all authorities, who do not get the benefit of damping grant are reduced by equivalent amounts.
Cllr Rex Osborn said that the Council papers made it quite clear that there was no financial justification for closing the Museum this year and that it was very arguable that there will be no better case next year – a one year stay of execution on the closure, whilst other alternatives were investigated was and is clearly practicable.
The Minister made it quite clear that one of the reasons for introducing capping was the blatant electoral politics Wandsworth played with Council Tax - it cut Council Tax by 25% before the 2002 election, and raised it by 57% the year after. The Government has reduced the scope for such massive and irresponsible increases and decreases.
There is still a big chance that the Wandsworth Conservatives will want to freeze the Council Tax in 2010 – to help them win the next local election. This is the real reason the Museum and libraries are being threatened with closure.
March 12, 2007