All suitably refreshed and raring to go again after yesterday’s festivities? I thought so….
But Fifers preparing to see in the New Year at the weekend and reflect on an eventful 2016 should possibly bear in mind that there’s a storm coming next year – and I’m not talking Barbara, Conor, Doris or even Ewan for that matter.
This week I joined some colleagues to have a good sit down chat with Fife Council leader David Ross to discuss various things on the back of the final episode of ‘The Council’ on BBC Scotland, and it suddenly struck me how difficult some of the choices our elected members will have to make come budget time will actually be.
Mr Ross was quite correct when he suggested that the programme will, at the very least, give normal Fifers a good frame of reference when talking about the savings that need to be made – rather than the eye-watering multi-million pound shortfalls being projected over the coming years.
And those figures are certainly eye-watering, perhaps one could even say tear-inducing, when you put them down in black and white.
Fife will have to save around £32 million when the 2017/18 budget is set, although officials believe that budget gap will increase to a staggering £115 million by the time 2019/20 rolls around.
The money has got to come from somewhere, but to be honest the choice of areas where cuts can be made is limited.
Council tax will have to go up to help mitigate the situation, most likely by the 3% limit set by the Scottish Government. Anything over and above that will probably mean a further grant reduction.
And there will inevitably be job losses. As many as 300 is the early estimation, although you would think most of those could be found without the need for compulsory redundancy.
However, there isn’t much scope to trim the fat elsewhere, particularly in social work and education, so the savings will have to come from services most people take for granted – such as roads, grass cutting, building maintenance and the like.
Cutting services people are used to won’t be popular. Yet with the local council elections coming in May, can our councillors come up with budget proposals that will balance the books whilst also securing the public’s votes?
Delivering a consensus budget without petty political point scoring from all sides would go a long way to peace and harmony in the Kingdom.
Trust me from years of experience though: no-one’s holding their breath on that score.