Don't cut social services in favour of roads, Lib Dem warns Buckinghamshire County Council (From Bucks Free Press)

Don't cut social services in favour of roads, Lib Dem warns Buckinghamshire County Council

3:00pm Friday 30th July 2010 in

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A LIBERAL Democrat has hit out at moves to slash funding for social services but keep cash for road repairs.

Councillor Julia Wassell spoke as more than £5.2m was cut from education and social services programmes at Conservative-run Buckinghamshire County Council.

It announced £9.2m worth of cuts from its £303m revenue budget this week after its funding was cut by the Government and demand for services rose.

The council planned to cut £106,000 from the road maintenance budget – but this will now come from road safety so cash can go to roads battered by December and January’s snow.

Cllr Julia Wassell, a member for Bowerdean, Micklefield & Totteridge in High Wycombe, said: “People put so much stock into highways because most council taxpayers are road users but there needs to be more commitment shown to social services and children and families.”

And Penny Gray, council branch secretary of the union Unison, said: “Care of vulnerable people is an area that should be safeguarded and ring-fenced.

“We are very concerned about the implications for service users and staff.”

Cuts include: • A 25 per cent funding cut for domestic violence programmes that will ‘reduce our preventative work with women and children at risk’.

• A 19 per cent cut for the Connexions schools career service, reducing ‘targeted work with disaffected young people’.

• A £317,000 cut in child protection that will ‘reduce our capacity to manage high level preventative work’.

• A £226,000 cut in frontline child protection staff that will hit ‘our capacity to manage the assessment process of children in need’.

• A reduction in residential beds for pensioners.

• A £68,000 cut in domiciliary care, home help, for OAPs.

• Fewer alcohol treatment services.

• A 10 per cent cut in staff who take calls from the public.

• A £30,000 reduction in the fund for new library books.

Council leader Cllr David Shakespeare blamed bankers and Labour’s ‘debt mountain’.

He said: “We have no choice but to make reductions in our budgets, to ensure we are not spending council taxpayers’ money which do not have.”

The children and young people department has taken the biggest hit, £5.4m. A rise in demand after the Baby P scandal is cited as a key reason for the cuts.

The second biggest chunk will come out of transportation, £2m.

Oxfordshire County Council confirmed it would cut funding to the Thames Valley Safer Roads Partnership, meaning Oxon speed cameras will be switched off on Sunday.

Bucks said it would cut funding if OCC did – leaving BCC in charge of cameras. Roads boss Cllr Valerie Letheren said: “It may be an option to keep some of them.”

But partnership spokesman Dan Campsall said: “You cannot continue to reduce death and injury on the roads at this rate without any resources to do so.”

Cllr Patricia Birchley, responsible for adult social services, said the cuts are ‘a real worry’ for her department.

Bosses are bracing themselves for further reductions when a major review of Government spending is announced in October. It already has more plans to save £52m over four years.

The authority gets the biggest share of the council tax, about £1,077.74, from a band D home.

It got a two per cent rise this year – but has been told by the Government this must be zero in 2011. The average bill in 2000 was £645.70.

The council was dealt a blow last week when it abandoned its ‘Pathfinder’ scheme to share services with other councils to save cash. It has cost all more than £1m in preparatory work.

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