EXCLUSIVE: Perthshire libraries spared axe in SNP budget plans as 10% council tax rise looms

The budget proposal would safeguard all five under-threat libraries, but Perth and Kinross council tax payers may have to dig deep to fund it

By Morag Lindsay

February 24 2025, 6:00am

Perth and Kinross Council leader Grant Laing will throw libraries a lifeline in his group's budget package. Image: Steve MacDougall/DC Thomson.

All five Perthshire libraries threatened with the axe could be spared under SNP budget plans.

Perth and Kinross Council’s administration will ask fellow councillors to support a £1 million rescue package on Wednesday.

The ruling SNP group wants to give an additional £500,000 to Culture Perth and Kinross for the coming year and another £500,000 the year after that.

The money would cover the cost of keeping the closure-threatened libraries in Alyth, Auchterarder, Birnam, Comrie and Scone open.

It would also help to safeguard other Culture Perth and Kinross services.

But the libraries funding will come with conditions.

Councillor Jack Welch on steps of Perth and Kinross HQ accepting petition from group of people with save our libraries placards — Perth and Kinross councillor Jack Welch accepted a 5,600-name Save Our Rural Libraries petition from campaigners. Image: Steve MacDougall/DC Thomson

Campaigners, who have fought to save their services, will be asked to work with culture chiefs, the council and their own communities to come up with ways to make their local libraries sustainable in the long-term.

The deal is part of a package of measures which Perth and Kinross Council Leader Grant Laing intends to present to colleagues when the full council meets to set the budget on Monday.

He is also proposing additional funding for road verge cutting and a freeze on garden waste permits in 2026/27 and 2027/28.

The good news could come at a cost for locals, however.

Overgrown grass verge by roadside — Perth and Kinross Council was criticised for a lack of grass verge cutting in some areas last summer. Image: Supplied

Councillors are also being asked to rubber-stamp a 10% rise in council tax for Perth and Kinross households next year.

SNP group’s Perth and Kinross budget breakdown

The SNP’s motion will also include:

• £9m investment – £3m over each of the next three years – to develop sites for commercial use across Perth and Kinross;

• £2m for bridge repairs and maintenance;

• An extra £1m in the roads maintenance budget;

• £1m towards community resilience teams which have been forming in local areas to respond to flooding and other emergencies;

• Funding to extend the opening hours at recycling centres;

• £1m towards transforming the way social care is provided;

• Funding for mental health charities, community sports, In Bloom groups and organisations working to tackle poverty;

• Continuation of free bus travel on the first Saturday of each month.

Budget decisions ‘not taken lightly’

All of the measures have yet to be voted on.

And leaders of the other political groups on Perth and Kinross Council will put forward their own amendments to the budget at Wednesday’s meeting too.

Perth and Kinross Council HQ, against background with banknotes design. — Perth and Kinross Council will set its budget for the year ahead on Wednesday.

If the 10% council tax rise is approved, residents living in a Band D property will pay an extra £11.70 a month from April 2025 – or £1,544.05 a year.

Mr Laing said this potential income, coupled with a higher than expected funding settlement from the Scottish Government, would help to cover the cost of the measures he is suggesting.

It will also mean there’s no need for cuts to services, compulsory redundancies, or to dip into the council’s reserves.

“This is the SNP administration’s budget,” he said.

“But no one group has a monopoly on good ideas. And I’ve reached out to the other groups to bring forward their suggestions too.