Council Cuts Come To Lewisham… And You Soon, Probably

By · July 6, 2010 at 9:00 am · No comments · Latest News · Report an error ·

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DICKSDAILY notes a cutback too far / from the Londonist Flickr pool

OK. We all, surely, knew that Tory promises to reduce the deficit while not cutting frontline services were nonsense, even as they were being made. But Lewisham’s one of the first places to find out exactly what that means on a borough level.

Mayor Steve Bullock, re-elected on the back of a local Labour landslide, has said cuts will be the “worst in living memory“. The council has to reduce spending by £60m over three years, which is £1 out of every £4 currently spent in the borough. Understandably, bloggers have been looking at the detail.

Alongside the sad and unsurprising job losses (aren’t our social workers, et al, already massively overstretched?) are proposed cutbacks everyone will be able to see. There’s outcry over the proposal to close five libraries. Blackheath, Crofton Park, Grove Park, New Cross and Sydenham are the ones under threat, galling after Culture Minister Ed Vaizey recently declared that “libraries create readers” at a speech to the Free Word Centre.

Deptford Dame notes plans to reduce street cleaning in an area that – much as we love it – desperately needs more, not less. Permanently closing automated loos is mooted, despite two new ones just being installed in Deptford, and if someone nicks your wheelie bin be prepared to pay £20 for a new one. Investment in parks is also due to be cut by a third a year for the next three years. It all just sounds generally miserable.

Cuts to council expenditure won’t just be limited to Lewisham. Part of the Chancellor’s deal for freezing our council tax was that councils would limit spending, not to mention general departmental reining in. Enfield has to find £6.8m in savings and it’s reported Greenwich is looking at £26.8m in cutbacks. What’s happening in Lewisham today might well be happening next door to you tomorrow.

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  • Dave

    I am genuinely loathe to spark the same predictable circular debate that we’ve already seen in the national media ad nauseam, but I still have to say that it really grinds my gears to hear Labour politicians such as Mayor Bullock carping on about these cuts. The Labour party are the unashamed architects of this mess, so they should either just apologise and help fix the problem, or keep their fucking mouths shut instead of revelling in the mess that they have created and rubbing everyone’s faces in it.

    These cuts will certainly suck, but it adds insult to injury to have to constantly hear the people who created the mess reminding us of how painful it’s going to be.

    I appreciate that, at a national level, it is the job of the opposition party to challenge the government, but at the same time the Labour party’s lack of contrition as they gloat over the problems they have caused is truly shameful.

    At a local level, I dare say that Mayor Bullock may have had little to do with the government decision-making that contributed to the massive deficit. But by draping himself in the colours of the party that caused the mess he has explicitly aligned himself with them. He (along with all local politicians) would have more credibility in opposing the cuts if he were to distance himself from the party that made them necessary.

    • RachelH

      It’s also interesting / painful (delete as appropriate) to note that of the three councils named, Lewisham has to cut by far the most. Bullock’s been in charge for eight years now, whatever the reasons behind Lewisham having to cut so much, he’s been at the helm. It’s also Labour’s decision on what to cut, since they are in such an overwhelming position of power on the Council.

      However, there’s also another argument that says the depth of the cuts required by the government is overkill, that it’s not necessary and could actually be harmful to reduce the deficit so fast, and that we’re all going to experience more pain than we need to. I’ll be interested to see whether any council takes up Osborne’s offer to help them freeze council tax because they would rather put the tax up by a little bit than have to make massive cuts. I suspect non will, though.

      • http://undefined Mike Harris

        Hi,

        As a Lewisham Councillor on the Public Accounts Select Committee I thought I’d do some slight myth busting! Lewisham doesn’t have to cut more than other local authorities, we predict that in the comprehensive spending review in the autumn our grant from central government could be slashed by as much as 25%. We are preparing for this scenario by outlining in detail, early, proposals for budget cuts. Other Councils aren’t doing this – which means their residents won’t get an opportunity to contribute to the debate about how we cut 25% of our budget.

        It’s massively unpleasant and the impact will be enormous on many services that people really rely upon. The political arguments are over the size of the reduction: the coalition government has committed to abolishing the deficit by 2014 / 2015. That means cutting quicker than a Labour government would have done. The increase in the tax free allowance on earnings and also not proceeding with our planned rise in national insurance, although popular, do mean that public spending has to be cut by a further c. £9 billion.

        We’re hoping that local people will get involved in this process via our local assemblies and I’m encouraging my constituents to let us know what is, and what isn’t acceptable.

        Ta!

        Mike Harris (Labour Councillor for Lewisham Central Ward)

        • http://undefined RachelH

          As a resident of Lewisham Central, Mike, I will be in touch… however, I find this approach somewhat backwards. You don’t how much you’ll have to cut, yet the Mayor is describing the cuts as “the worst in living memory”? How are residents supposed to contribute – there will be a public consultation on the libraries, but I see nothing on the Lewisham website yet about this or anything else (nor any clearer way of viewing proposed cuts than trawling through a series of PDFs). What’s planned? Or is this actually going to turn out to be a cynical exercise in announcing far worse cuts than needed, then declaring the Council to be saviours when government reductions turn out to be less than expected?

          *humph*

          • http://undefined Mike Harris

            To cut any Council service there has to be a statuatory consultation and then to deliver the cost saving it can take a few years (redundancy payments, etc). We predict that we need to deliver £60m worth of cost savings based on the fact that in the budget the coalition announced cuts worth about 25 – 30% per department (once you ring-fence international development and the NHS). We need to plan a minimum of 3 years in advance – therefore we’re sketching out savings now so that if we need to be can deliver a ‘balanced budget’. Local Councils aren’t allowed to borrow except for capital improvements – so if we get our budget cut by 25% and don’t manage to cut costs in time then we have to slash services that can be cut at short notice (which isn’t acceptable really).

            There’s going to be a lot of consultation – and Councillors, the Mayor and his Cabinet really mean this. When you start looking at the budget options you realise how difficult some of these choices are.

            Consultation will be through the local assembly, the next one will be on Monday 11 October 2010 (probably at the Methodist Church, Albion Way)… hope to see you there!

  • Dave

    “However, there’s also another argument that says the depth of the cuts required by the government is overkill, that it’s not necessary and could actually be harmful to reduce the deficit so fast, and that we’re all going to experience more pain than we need to.”

    Yes indeed. I am not sufficiently economically literate to know which of these arguments, if any, is most likely to be the correct one. But it’s hard to give *any* credibility to the ‘wisdom’ of those who presided over the creation of this mess. (Even if, in the long run, they turn out to be right.)

  • http://undefined Franco Milazzo

    I don’t think it’s anything much to do with economics and all to do with politics. Politicians are blatant opportunists to a (wo)man and are going to try to bury as much bad news while everyone is on holiday or thinking about one sport or the other. Also, her majesty’s loyal opposition has never been above scoring political points esp. after just being dumped out of power – cue Labour councillors blaming all this on the new government (not our fault guv, oh no).

    A not-inconsiderable factor is that Labour believes in big high tax/high spend government. When things go wrong, they go wrong in a big way. If we don’t want that kind of thing, we’d be best off voting in millionaires who will be prepared to sell off all public services, cut nice-to-haves and reduce essential expenditure to a minimum. Oh, we just did. Fiddlesticks.

    PS Love the tag “wereallfucked” :D

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