Around 700 jobs could go at Fife Council over the next three years as it tries to balance the books amid a “perfect financial storm”.
A £14.5 million package of proposals has been unveiled for the next financial year as the authority aims to close a budget gap of £92.6m between 2014 and 2017.
Proposing the Labour administration’s draft revenue budget, council leader Alex Rowley warned that it would not be possible to take £14 million out of the current Fife Council budget without it impacting on jobs and services.
He said: “Over the next three years there could potentially be an impact on around 700 posts as a result of budget proposals.
“At the moment these are just estimates and, if the proposals are taken forward, we will focus on making sure the impact on jobs is managed through natural turnover, vacancy management, redeployment and voluntary redundancy wherever possible.”
He emphasised that the thrust of a mooted £15 million investment was to tackle social inequality and create educational opportunities in some of Fife’s most deprived communities and said the approach being taken was to “prioritise and protect” key frontline services.
Opposition leader Peter Grant described the impact of cuts on education in particular as a “betrayal”.
For full coverage of the budget proposals, see Wednesday’s Fife edition of The Courier or try our digital edition.