Labour Councillors To Scrutinise SNP Over New Charges
1/ For Education Convenor from Councillor Patrick McGlinchey: Following the review carried out by an external consultant;The SNP has agreed a cut of £500,000 from the Education Budget in the 2010/11 Budget. Will the Convenor of Education and Lifelong Learning advise members when the Executive Director will be in a position to report members what services are being cut?
2/ For Heed Convenor from Councillor Douglas McAllister: The SNP has introduced a new service charge of £48 a year for 2,500 elderly residents for the care of garden scheme which had traditionally been provided free by previous Labour Administrations;How will the new charge will be collected?
3/ For Heed Convenor from Councillor David McBride: The SNP has introduced a new service charge of £15 for each Domestic Bulk Rubbish uplift which was traditionally provided free by the previous Labour Administrations; How will the new charges be applied?
4/ For Social Work Convenor from Councillor Gail Casey: The SNP have imposed a new service charge of £1 per meal for Home Care to 570 housebound and elderly residents; What steps will be taken to ensure that the service will be continued should he service user is unable to pay?
5/ For Social Work Convenor from Councillor John Millar: The SNP have introduced a new service charge of £2.50 per trip for the 160 pensioners and adults with learning difficulties using day care facilities, this will raise £104,000 per year; s this charge per journey or per round trip? How will the SNP Administration guarantee that the budgeted saving of £104,000 will be realised?
6/ For Social Work Convenor from Councillor Geoff Calvert: The SNP introduced a new service charge on people with mobility problems. The 500 clients will be required to pay for 50% of the cost of special needs equipment. It is estimated that they will pay £200 each raising an extra £100,000 from disabled people; What items will be affected by the SNP charge and what will not have this charge applied? How will the SNP Administration guarantee that the budgeted saving target of £100,000 is achieved?
7/ For Social Work Convenor from Councillor Gail Casey:The SNP has introduced new service charge of £20 per week for 240 Housing Support Services clients including people with learning disabilities; people with mental health problems; people with addiction problems; people with acquired brain injury; and some older people and people with physical disabilities.How will this the charge will be collected?
8/ For Education Convenor from Councillor Patrick McGlinchey:The SNP has introduced a new service charge of £5 per week for ‘privilege seats’ on school bus contracts affecting 61 pupils.What method will be used to allow pupils to pay for the new charge?
Here are the answers given by the SNP Administration. I’ll get a copy of Bill Hendrie’s answers to 2 and 3 and post them later in the week.
It should be noted that only Councillors Gail Casey and Geoff Calvert bothered to show up to ask these questions and hear the answers.
So much for Labour caring about the issues.
Question 1 – Answered by Cllr May Smillie
I would first note that Labour also took this option in their own budget proposals and I am concerned that they chose to take this option without understanding the processes involved.
I would also note that while Cllr McGlinchey is not willing to answer questions on Labour’s Education proposals, he seems perfectly willing to ask questions.
It should be noted that Labour’s budget also took away free school milk from all school children, cut teacher numbers and took free school meals out of the mouths of Primary 1 to 3 children.
However, the SNP welcome Labour’s late conversion to supporting the engagement of an external consultant to review the Education Department.
The report on this work has been completed and is currently a topic of discussion between Mr McMillan, Mr Lanagan and Trade Unions with a view to making recommendations to Council in the near future.
Question 4 – Answered by Cllr Jonathan McColl
In common with the other charges, the £1 per meal charge was implemented by the SNP to offset part of the cost. The range of reasonable charges implemented have allowed us to protect public sector jobs and continue to provide services for the people of West Dunbartonshire despite the recession.
It is interesting to note the contrast in approach taken by the opposition. Labour are clear that they do not agree with the charges, and as is proper, they put forward a different way of balancing the budget.
Labour’s budget proposals reduced the level of charging by implementing a range of savage cuts, including the closure of Community Halls and the Cessation of Support Services to Community Groups; rather hypocritical given their campaigning against our slight reduction in Community Work last year.
This will be the 5th time Councillors have been told that nobody will be denied a service because they cannot afford it. The Chief Social Work Officer has stated this twice at different Council meetings and I have made the same comment in both Council and Committee three times now.
There is a system in place within the Social Work and Health Department that allows care managers to request a waiver or reduction in charge where the charge results in financial hardship.
All frontline care staff have been given a written briefing and know that they should contact their line managers if they perceive a problem. Likewise, all clients have been sent a personalised letter outlining how the charges affect them and who they can talk to if they have concerns.
Question 5 – Answered by Cllr Jonathan McColl
I would refer Councillor Millar to the Council decision, minuted and sent to members in print and available 24/7 to every member of the public on the Council website, or by phoning and asking for a copy.
The decision, as minuted, clearly states that the charge is for a round trip.
As Councillor Millar should be aware, there are never any guarantees when it comes to budgets, especially while we remain at the mercy of Labour’s national debt fuelled recession. Indeed, the Labour Opposition budget this year had comment all through it saying that the indicated savings may not be achieved.
It may help Councillor Millar to remember to which document I am referring if I point out that this is the document where he and his Labour party colleagues thought it was a good idea to cut police funding; the same document where Labour decided to make an arbitrary cut of 10% in the training budget without knowing the true impact on service users and staff.
What I can tell Councillor Millar is that despite significant, unexpected, need led pressures on the Social Work department this year, we are projecting a favourable outturn.
I will continue to play my part scrutinising the budget’s progress in year and Officers at all levels in the department have my full support and confidence in their ability to deliver the best possible end of year outturn while continuing to provide first class services to everyone who needs them.
Question 6 – Answered by Cllr Jonathan McColl
Once again we have a question that both I and the Directorate have answered. It staggers me that the Labour group thought it was appropriate to vote on the issue last November when they clearly don’t have a clue what was being discussed.
This charge is for provision of what is termed special needs equipment. It is not for adaptations. There is a large list of equipment that is provided to clients ranging from grab rails, to raised toilet seats, to shower chairs, to riser recliners and other special chairs. Modern technology moves fast and the list of aids is growing everyday.
Thanks to our partnership with other local authorities and the NHS in using ‘equipu’, formerly Greater Glasgow Independent Living Equipment Store, our clients have access to a vast array of equipment to help them in their daily lives.
I would encourage any Councillor who receives a query from a constituent to speak with Social Work Senior Management who will be able to advise you.
The assumption of a 50% charge is incorrect and I’ll explain this in a little more detail for members.
The charges made to clients will vary and will range from a £20 minimum charge to £75 maximum. It should be noted that the charges are per order, not per item, meaning a total maximum charge of £75. The suggestion of a £200 charge is typical Labour scaremongering.
It is also worth noting that no service user will be charged more than £75 in any 12 month period regardless of their level of need.
As I have indicated earlier, it is not possible to guarantee the level of income identified, as this will depend on the needs of clients and their ability to pay. Remember, no service user will be refused a service due to an inability to pay.
Question 7 – Answered by Cllr Jonathan McColl
I will start by saying that this projected quarter million pound contribution towards the cost of the service will not be collected by withdrawing free school milk as Labour have attempted to do.
Following the lead of their Tory brethren before them, Labour are sucking the life out of Scotland, this time to the tune of around £800million; less of a ‘single transferrable excuse’ more the single best reason for voters to back the SNP at the ballot box.
The next parliament is almost guaranteed to be a hung parliament and the people of West Dunbartonshire and Scotland as a whole need a strong SNP presence to protect Scotland’s interests in the face of further public sector cuts, promised by all of the London based parties.
It should be noted that people who receive benefits, do so in order to pay for services such as those we are charging for. West Dunbartonshire Council has an award winning Welfare Rights service who are ensuring that everyone is in receipt of all the benefits they are entitled to.
Unlike Councillor Patrick McGlinchey who refused to take questions on his party’s Education proposals last month, I will finish answering this final question having answered all of the questions put before me tonight.
This charge will be invoiced and can be collected in a range of ways depending on the needs and wishes of the clients, carers or other legally appointed representatives. More detail can be sought from Stephen West.
Question 8 – Answered by Cllr May Smillie
Interesting to see Cllr McGlinchey talking about privileges again. At the budget in January, his group were proposing the establishment of an elitist school where only the most academically gifted children would have time and resource invested in their education to the detriment of every other pupil in West Dunbartonshire.
Parents are being invoiced for the charges and the invoices have already been raised through the Corporate Finance System of the Council with the agreement of parents involved.
Chancellor darling recently introduced an increase of +8% on Employers National Insurance Contribution.
At a time of recession this increase is effectively a tax on jobs, and indeed, in the case of West Dunbartonshire Council, this increase will equate to an increase of around £1.3 million on the annual council wage bill.
Since this sum is the amount required to employ around 40 average waged council employees, will the labour councillor’s confirm if they consider Darlings ENIC increase to be a tax on jobs.
Moreover, with London Labour increasing employment taxes will the Labour councillors comment on whether or not they agree with the taxpayer supported Royal Bank of Scotland paying out £1,600,000,000 in bonuses this year.
Indeed, do they agree that over a hundred RBS bankers are entitles to bonus payments of over £1,000,000 each whilst every business, NHS hospital and council in WDC is being rewuired to pay additional ENIC.
As promised, here are Bill’s answers to the remaining two questions.
Question 2 – Answered by Cllr Bill Hendrie
This Council has had a need to introduce a charge for this service for one underlying reason.
The Labour government in London has run up a £178 billion debt and is now cutting public expenditure throughout the UK in order to balance their books.
In consequence, the Labour Party has cut Scotland’s fixed budget by over £800 million this year and intends to do similar next year resulting in a Labour cut for all Councils.
This has resulted in the dilemma we now face on this and every other council; either discontinue some non-statutory services or levy a charge in order to maintain the service.
This Council chose to maintain the Care of Garden’s Scheme.
It costs approximately £150 per annum per garden and it isn’t therefore unreasonable to charge clients less than a third of that cost in order to maintain this and other services, such as free school milk, which the Labour group tried to abolish.
Council agreed that this contributory charge should be payable in instalments.
It is a matter for officers to arrange a method of payment and not the place of Councillors to micro-manage Council services.
However, officers intend that invoices will be issued at end February / early March and require that participants will be able to pay a one off charge of £48 by the end of March or four £12 payments; the first payment to be paid by March 31st and three more payments to be made by the end of May, July and September.
Question 3 – Answered by Cllr Bill Hendrie
This Council has had a need to introduce a £15 charge for the removal of domestic bulk waste was driven by a number of factors.
Scotland’s public finances are being squeezed due to the cuts in public funding by the Labour government who have run up the largest public debt ever in peace time.
The disposal of waste is not free. Indeed the Labour government in London has dramatically increased the land fill tax, which has added to the cost of the disposal of waste.
Charges for the removal of domestic waste were only free in the early days of this Council. The Labour party introduced a charge of £36 for the removal of some items a number of years ago.
The charge of £15 is still below the true cost to provide the service, which means every other Council tax payer must subsidise the cost of each uplift.
Methods of payments are the same as they are for every other charge applied by the Council.
It is also worth commenting that there have been a number of recent changes in European law, which now require retailers to offer to remove all packaging waste free of charge and to offer to remove white goods when customers purchase a new item.
It is also worth noting that the Labour budget did not seek to reverse this charge.
SNP led West Dunbartonshire Council are to disband the world renowned Early Intervention and Network Support team as part of their 2010 budget plans. In December, Chief Executive David McMillan called in education consultant Mr Michael O’Neill to carry out a review of education services. The review examined the existing education structures and is expected to make recommendations to disband the Early Intervention Service and the Network Support Service in June this year. In addition the consultants report is expected to recommend that specialist education teachers including physical education teachers and music teachers posts will be deleted. The report also recommends that Library and Cultural services are merged and that both Psychological Services and the Quality Improvement Service is reduced. The Labour budget proposals guaranteed that following the strategic review a report was to be presented to the Education & Lifelong Learning Committee for consideration. However, the SNP budget proposals included authority for the Executive Director of Education, Mr Terry Lanagan, to make £500,000 worth of cuts without the need for any further political approval from councillors. Labour Group Leader, Councillor Martin Rooney Said: ‘It is a matter of public record that Labour budget proposals included a Strategic Investment Fund to allow for further enhancements in the Early Intervention Programme and Specialist Primary School Teachers. In addition the motion from Labours Finance Spokesman, Councillor David McBride included a committment that Labours budget proposals would be subject to an equality impact assessment, statutory and formal and trade union consultation.’ Labours Education Spokesman Councillor Patrick McGlinchey added: ‘The Nationalists have rubber stamped £500,000 worth of cuts in education with a blindfold on and it now transpires that the greatest casualty of all will be West Dunbartonshire’s world renowned Early Intervention Programme. There’s an irony in the fact that as local authorities across the UK and Governments around the globe look to duplicate the West Dunbartonshire Early Intervention Programme the short sighted SNP are moving to scrap it without consultation. The Early Intervention Programme is transforming lives; children who previously would have slipped through the net and lived a life of illiteracy now have their sights set on university and I want to see that continue. It’s always been Labour’s aim to harness all of the potential of all of our children all of the time, so we’ll be doing everything we can to stop the SNP wrecking our children’s live chances by abolishing this live changing programme.’
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