Well this is interesting. Not interesting as in “Madonna’s got another new husband” or “Cheryl Cole’s endorsed another shampoo”, but in a “slightly dull but actually quite significant” sort of way.
Anyone still reading after that cheerless introduction? Well, no matter, let’s crack on. I’ve found the Opposition budget for Glasgow City Council, the one that almost brought down the administration. I mean, I say I’ve found it, as if I’ve been raking around the internet like some sort of nerdy cyber-sleuth. In fact, I just googled it and discovered that Councillor Alex Dingwall had helpfully put it on his website. Thanks, Councillor Alex Dingwall.
My last post looked at the detail of the Labour budget and expressed surprise that it was mostly tinkering round the edges of a budget largely constructed by Council officials.
So is the Opposition one any different? More to the point, does it highlight a fundamental difference of political philosophy between Labour and its opponents?
The opposition budget did not reverse any of the spending cuts proposed by Labour, but instead added a few extra, including £55,000 to be saved by reducing taxi use (just how many taxis do these people take?), £450k extra through energy efficiency, £210k by reducing use of mobile devices, a £500k cut in advertising, improved collection of council tax, a review of all expenditure over £500, renting out council rooms, cutting park lawns less often, a 10% increase in car park charges and a reduction in external training.
There was also a proposal to save £2.5mn by changing staff terms and conditions and to save almost £1.5mn by reinstating maximum class sizes of 20 in S1/S2 maths and English. (I’m not sure how this is a saving: it sounds like an item of expenditure to me, but it’s shown as a cut, so what do I know?)
So what did they want to spend all this money on? Well, there was a cost-neutral proposal for an extra 200 recycling bins, £32 million to build primary schools, £250k for 6 additional English as a Foreign Language teachers, £500k for a task force of 10 new teachers to increase attainment in schools and £200k for improved learning centres. There was also an extra £2mn for Glasgow Regeneration Agency for more employment and training aimed at young people.
Beyond that, an extra £70k would have funded a Carers’ Champion to “carer-proof” council policies and a 20% increase in funding for carers’ centres.
In total, the Opposition proposed additional savings of almost £7mn and expenditure of just over that sum. As with the Labour budget, these are actually tiny changes to an overall Glasgow City Council budget of £2,329.646 million.
So what can we learn from this? Several things. Firstly, Glasgow’s budget is mostly set by officials. Councillors just footer about with it.
Secondly, there is not much sign of a cohesive political philosophy behind the Opposition budget: but that’s hardly surprising, since it was the product of three different parties who rarely come together. The interesting point is that they managed to do so: increasing the likelihood of a coalition Council after the May elections, if the SNP don’t achieve an overall majority.
And such a majority might now be harder to achieve. Because thirdly, the SNP is unlikely to get many votes from Council staff, having shown its hand with its proposal to change their terms and conditions. Does this matter? Maybe: the Council has 24,000 employees. In 2010, almost 460,000 people were registered to vote in Glasgow. In 2007, the turnout across Scotland was 52%: but that was on the same day as the Scottish Parliament elections. We can assume that turnout will be lower this time round, since people are less likely to vote in a local election than a national. So on a 45% turnout, 207,000 people will vote in the May elections. That means that up to 11% of those voting could work for the Council – and given that their pay and terms are under threat, we can assume that council employees will be highly motivated to get down to the polling station.
The SNP has put the wind up Labour by successfully working with the other Opposition parties to create a budget, and has positioned itself as a credible council administration. But in doing so, has it scared voting Council staff back into the arms of Labour?