Row over austerity flares as Greenwich council’s budget is confirmed

By Lachlan Leeming, Local Democracy Reporter

A town hall has confirmed its budget for the forthcoming year, in a fiery meeting which saw the authority’s two parties argue over austerity.

Ahead of the vote at Greenwich council, cabinet member for finance and resource Christine Grice admitted she was “deeply disappointed yet again this is a transitional budget”.

She added the authority was “still waiting for the Government to set out long-term funding solutions” for high pressure areas such as adult social care.

She said feedback from residents had informed decisions to put £1.1m towards the authority’s emergency support service and a Universal Credit support team.

The budget also includes £1.5m investment into providing council tax support for all low-income households, as well as £1.5m towards addressing the climate emergency.

However, she warned resources across the council departments were tighter than ever after a decade of under-funding from the Government, with adult social costs taking up the largest spend in the budget.

The opposition tabled an amendment, with Conservative leader Matt Hartley proposing what he said was a “more efficient” budget.

Cllr Hartley said the Tory amendment would remove £840,000 of “waste and inefficiency,” without affecting a single front line service, and would reverse cabinet proposals cutting funding to play centres and pavement washing.

He said: “In addition to removing waste and inefficiency and reversing some of the cabinet’s unnecessary cuts to services, our amendment would see the council spending £1.1 million less over the four-year period – while delivering exactly the same level of ongoing savings to the base budget by the end of 2024.”

He added the Conservative Party had also written to new Chancellor Rishi Sunak and appealed for help for more Government help

But Labour councillors attacked the amendment.

Council leader Danny Thorpe said: “I find it deeply, deeply offensive to hear about waste and inefficiency, and nothing about people.”

Cllr Thorpe claimed 10 years of Government austerity had acted as a “sledgehammer” to residents, highlighting the case of Greenwich Winter Night Shelter, where volunteers were providing overnight shelter to homeless people in the borough who had “nowhere to go”.

He was backed by fellow Labour councillor Mehboob Khan, who slammed the amendment.

Cllr Khan said: “There’s no imagination here, he trotted out the same savings he did last year. It’s trying to fool the public saying there’s more services here without having to pay for it.

“It’s duplicitous and is playing with politics in the most cynical manner possible.”

Cllr Hartley, in response, said he found assertions the amendment wasn’t about people “pretty offensive”.

Pictured top: Councillors vote on the budget at Wednesday’s meeting