Wirral Council’s Conservative leader said it would have been "irresponsible" if his party had voted against a council tax rise.
The vote came during a heated budget setting meeting for the next financial year as Wirral Council looked to close a £32m budget gap.
In the meeting, Conservative councillors in Wirral voted against the budget for next year, which included setting overall spending and key proposals on services like libraries and leisure services. The Conservatives also voted against setting the schools budget for the next financial year.
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The Conservatives had spoken out against the tax rise on the doorstop and in the meeting but they eventually voted for a council tax rise of 4.99% along with Labour, the Greens, and the Liberal Democrats.
The council tax rise would have passed without Conservative votes but Cllr Tom Anderson argued it would have been “irresponsible” for them to vote against it and broken the law, adding: “That would be opposition for opposition’s sake.”
Every year councils are required to set a balanced budget. This meant Wirral Council had to look at how it could cut spending and raise income to close the gap of £32m.
A budget to close the gap had been put forward by Labour, and supported by the Greens and the Liberal Democrats and was accepted by the council’s financial officer as balanced on the condition council tax would rise.
Wirral Council's deficit had been driven by rising inflation and energy costs according to council reports. This was also backed up by the council’s financial watchdog who said the local authority wasn’t to blame for the gap and praised steps to improve finances.
Cllr Anderson however said they had voted against the budget because of ongoing concerns over purchase order payments and pointed to the council accidentally paying a contractor £200,000 twice. He also pointed to an increase of £20m given to the council by the government, £6m more than expected.
He said: “Look there’s various parts of the budget we voted on, that’s why. We didn’t agree with the way the council tax was being spent. We didn’t agree with spending £127m on ourselves. We didn’t agree on a budget that is going to burden the taxpayer for the next four years.”
Cllr Anderson however denied saying one thing and voting for another, adding: “There’s various parts of the budget. Once we voted against Labour’s proposed budget, we’ve got to set a level of council tax. We weren’t happy with the council tax rise but we’re not willing to go down the road of Liverpool to financial ruin and not set a balanced budget.”
After the meeting, a Conservative councillor had claimed the Conservatives voted against the council tax rise and later, Cllr Anderson also said they had agreed to set an overall council services budget and schools funding, two things the Conservatives had voted against.
Cllr Anderson did acknowledge the Conservatives hadn’t voted for a schools budget or an overall budget of £366m and said this was because it “was linked to the overall Labour budget.”
He added: “That’s why we didn’t support it there. At the end of the day when we lose all those votes, we need to take into account a legal budget and we weren't going to go down the road of breaking the law.”
Cllr Anderson argued Wirral could have made savings on sharing services with other councils or top executive pay, proposals he said he would have put forward though didn't provide any figures on how much this would save.
While a review of top staff pay within the council was included as part of this year’s budget going forward, Cllr Tom Anderson said this could have come sooner and the council was yet to produce any savings from it.
He also argued Wirral’s situation was different, pointing to the council requesting emergency funding from the government in 2021 of £10m and argued schemes such as a Wirral bank and the Hoylake golf resort were examples of poor financial management.
Cllr Anderson said: “This is why we’re in this situation. We've borrowed and borrowed on superfluous projects, not looked at the council’s core and not looked at the money we’ve spent on ourselves and looked at the services we want to deliver for our residents.”
On the issue of payments made without purchase order documentation, Cllr Anderson was especially critical. He said the situation was “untenable,” adding: “It’s taken now four years. Ask any business “would you pay without a purchase order?” and of course they wouldn’t.
“There are some exceptions in statutory services but why have you taken four years? It’s council tax payers money.”
A new finance system is expected to go live in April after its launch was delayed by 12 months in April 2022.
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