Medway Council asks central government to borrow £14m

Medway council has written to central government asking for the ability to borrow funds as it faces a £14 million shortfall.

Transcript

00:00 Ollie, what is that you're holding in your hand? Some important looking papers you've got there.

00:03 Well, Sophia, this isn't actually my fan mail. This is the budget for the next year that the

00:11 council are putting forward to cabinet next week. It's not even all of it. There could be up to 1200

00:16 pages of council documentation that they're going to have to go through. Of course, this only came

00:21 out an hour and a half ago. We haven't had a chance to go through all of it. But the headlines so far,

00:27 14.8 million pounds in short fill that has to be filled. Well, Mary Council went to the

00:32 government last week asking for the ability to borrow the money. They did ask for tax increases

00:38 as well for council tax. They were not given permission to do this. They were not in such

00:42 a financial state as someone like Thurrock or Birmingham. But they are asking for increased

00:47 borrowing. If they don't get that ability, though, the chance of getting a credible budget across the

00:52 line is the same chance of me reading this in the next half an hour. Well, what does this mean if

00:59 they can't meet this budget shortfall, though? Well, I spoke to Vince Maple to find out what

01:05 happened if it doesn't happen. The report is very clear. Actually, SIFR's words, not my words,

01:11 is that if neither element of support is given, that actually it is impossible to set a credible

01:18 balanced budget. Those are not my words, the words of SIFR. So it shows the challenges that

01:22 we have as a council. That's why we've taken their advice and recommendations. We've made

01:27 the request to central government. As I say, one element of that has been rejected, but we're

01:32 hopeful on the second element and we'll continue to work on that basis. From what we know so far,

01:38 Oli, what does this mean for the people of Medway? Well, it does mean increased charges across the

01:46 board in some things like pay and display, for example, 60 pence increase on parking. But there

01:53 are other increases to late library dues will increase as well up to 100 percent. Get those

02:00 books in before April. And there are other areas as well that are going up in line with inflation.

02:07 So the crematorium fees. I did speak to Vince Maple about this, how this is going to impact

02:13 people, obviously during the cost of living crisis. This is what he said to that. I think

02:19 this is a really challenging balance and I think we struck the balance just about right. Of course,

02:23 we will always look at what our colleagues and neighbours in other councils are doing and we'll

02:28 compare and contrast. So where we have introduced or increased some fees, although they are going

02:33 up, they're still relatively low, perhaps compared to some of the other councils across Kent. And

02:38 residents and viewers can look at that and make the comparisons themselves. All of those decisions

02:43 to increase fees and charges, of course, the pressure from the 91 percent cut in the revenue

02:49 support grant means that we're having to take those challenging decisions.

02:53 Well, of course, with Cabinet and Council coming up later this month, all eyes will be on the

03:01 council and the government to see if they can get this budget across the line.