This week:

• I attended the November meeting of CIty Council. I had asked a written question about the budget consultation and I asked two questions during the meeting (these also have to be submitted in advance:

Written Question

The People’s Budget tool was presented as an opportunity for residents across the city to shape the council’s financial plan.
Resident engagement is always welcome but there are some limitations placed on decisions within this tool that do not reflect the actual budget situation. For example:

• There is no scope given to switch funding e.g. The income from the Accelerated Development Zone that has been allocated to eventscould be used for other purposes and there is flexibility within the Public Health budget as long as it is used for public health purposes
• There is no option to reduce the numbers of senior staff
• The use of reserves is not given as an option, although they have been used by this administration.

Can Councillor Kilgour explain why the ‘People’s Budget’ was framed in this way? Can she also explain why the impacts of cuts are described in catastrophic scenarios ‘Council website crashes’, ‘Unions threaten strikes over job cuts’; ‘Increasing number of kids put in dangerous unregulated homes’ rather than factually? (e.g. Reduced maintenance, job losses etc.).

Response

“All the information and data that sits behind the People’s Budget was gathered and scrutinised together with members of our Finance
Department, Business Management, and Directorate Leadership Teams. However, it is not possible for the People’s Budget to be an exhaustive tool that reviews every element of council spending. The main objective of the tool is to educate and inform communities across the city about the financial challenges facing local authorities, and the difficult decisions all councillors need to consider.

We’ve successfully used the tool for a number of years to supplement other engagement and consultation activities and we have received positive feedback. One of the challenges has always been to strike the right balance between the level of detail provided and the ease and accessibility of the tool.

The budget simulator does provide some breakdown within each of the categories so that users are able to understand what will make up the individual budgets. However, the tool itself will categorise reductions into three risk levels when users are making efficiencies – low, medium and high. Each of these risks will then have a narrative attached to it which users will see when they attempt to make efficiencies in a specific area. This narrative was determined between officers from directorates across the council as theoretical outcomes of the savings. We do believe there is a need for this narrative so that users are able to understand the consequences of making such a cut, but in reality, the specific consequence listed may not materialise. There are of course a number of ways which the saving could be met and the consequences would vary if it was a cut at the higher or lower end of one of these specific risk categories.

However, we accept the challenge on some of the narrative and can reflect on this in future iterations of the simulator. In terms of the
consideration for additional functionality of the tool, we would note that the simulator currently takes on average around 10 minutes to complete and, by adding additional considerations, we risk reducing the effectiveness of the tool as an effective engagement mechanism for residents across the city. The purpose of the simulator is first and foremost an educational tool to demonstrate the challenges when it comes to balancing our budget. There will be some learning we can take from submitted budgets, and the in person engagement events, that will be shared with officers and members, but that is not the primary purpose of the tool. We would also add that we have developed this tool with a third party developer and introducing additional functionality and considerations would come at a cost. However, we do welcome the feedback and can consider this in our conversations for future campaigns around the People’s Budget.”

I think the key point in this, extremely long, answer is the phrase “The main objective of the tool is to educate and inform communities across the city about the financial challenges facing local authorities”.

There are definitely huge challenges: Newcastle City Council has lost more than £400m since 2010. There are still funds available and choices being made, however. The council paid to host the Mercury Prize in Newcastle but claimed it couldn’t afford £40000 a year to keep the City Library open on Saturday afternoons. The Labour administration is entitled to make choices but I think it should be open about the fact it is doing so. And it should give residents a genuine chance to give their views on what those choices should be. Sadly this Council isn’t willing to be open or honest with residents about its budget choices or its budget tool: Its own media release described the People’s Budget Tool as “a bid to give greater power to communities” not as something whose “main objective is to educate and inform”.

Oral Question 1

Will Councillor Kilgour commit to a policy of transparency with city residents about the potential use of Leazes Park, and any other land owned by the city, by Newcastle United Football Club?
If so, will she demonstrate that transparency by telling Council what discussions there have been with NUFC or its representatives about the
sale, lease or transfer by any other means of Leazes Park from the city council to the club?

Response

This question was answered by Coun Hay. He said that the council was committed to transparency but there were “commercial confidentiality issues”. When I asked whether he would tell residents why there were more than 30000 emails between the council and the club apparently relating to Leazes Park (I found this out in a reply to an FOI explaining why the council wouldn’t be giving me an answer), he said he wouldn’t comment on ‘rumour and speculation’. I think Newcastle residents have the right to know what is being suggested for their park and to have a say on the final decision. Sadly, the Labour administration seems to see things differently. (This discussion was covered in the Evening Chronicle )

Oral Question 2

How can residents know whether the Mercury Prize event was worth the public money that was spent on it?

Response

I had asked this question in response to a section in the ‘Cabinet Statement’ (a new document that replace the detailed reports that used to be produced) celebrating the Mercury Prize event. Coun Samad told me that the financial return on investment will be shared in the findings of an independently produced impact assessment and that this was in the statement.

The Cabinet Statement does not actually mention that the financial return on investment will be public: “We are conducting a comprehensive impact study for the Mercury Awards and related activity and will make findings public when available.”

If it is made public, which I would welcome, it would contradict the response I was given to my question to Coun Samad at July’s Council Meeting (received on September 3): “As this is commercially sensitive information, we cannot reveal the hosting/ sponsorship fees related to the Mercury prize.”

I have contacted Coun Samad asking him to clarify which of the answers I have been given is correct.

I also voted against a reduction in scrutiny committees which is part of the Labour administration’s reduction in democracy at the council. I have written more about my concerns about this here.

• I continued discussions on the licensing, repair and planning issues that I have mentioned in previous updates.
• I was also contacted by a local business experiencing racially motivated anti-social behaviour. I contacted the police and the council’s community safety team to ask them to provide support. (The rise in openly racist behaviour is extremely concerning – we have had weekly protests by racists claiming to be concerned about people’s safety – a claim that’s undermined by their aggressive behaviour and hate-filled chants – on the Blue Carpet since early August. )