SOUTH Gloucestershire Council’s leader has warned of more cuts to come in the future, despite the latest council tax rise.
The council is also raising garden waste collection fees from £60 to £70, bringing in charges at many car parks, and axing funding to maintain public toilets and playing fields.
Leader Maggie Tyrrell (Lib Dem, Thornbury) said the budget will be balanced over two years, using reserves to achieve this for the second year.
But the authority faces having to make about £12 million more savings by 2028/29 to break even, on top of £40.3m from previous budgets and £1.1m this year.
Cllr Tyrrell told the cabinet meeting on February 3 that the council’s central government grant for the coming financial year is “very slightly higher than we had anticipated”, but would make little fundamental difference to its overall financial situation.
She said: “We are going to break even this year and we anticipate that we will do the same next year, but we will have to dip into our reserves to do so.
“The following year we have the budget gap.
“So we can’t rest on our laurels, we have to keep looking for savings and that is exactly what we have been doing.”
The council tax rise was capped 4.99%, including 2% for social care, despite some authorities being allowed to increase bills by up to 10%.
Cllr Tyrrell said: “We are forced into a position of taking the maximum that we can, simply because of the ongoing pressures and the lack of funding that has been coming into local government generally.”
The government has announced multi-year financial settlements for councils from next year, to give them more certainty on financial planning for future years.
But Cllr Tyrrell said the “vast majority” of spending was on adult care and children’s services, including “ever-increasing demand” for education and healthcare plans for children with special needs.
The council was also looking to invest in assistive technology to help people with disabilities live at home, and preventing domestic violence.
Meeting report by Adam Postans, Local Democracy Reporting Service