Hammersmith and Fulham residents get 3 per cent cut
Hammersmith and Fulham Council has said that it will cut council tax by 3 per cent, and that Londoners are charged too much tax.
According to the council, in ten years the average council tax bill in London has risen by 86 per cent.
Council leader Stephen Greenhalgh said: "Too many families are being crippled by high bills. With high interest rates and the cost of living rising, we simply do not believe people can afford to pay any more."
The Government announced its Revenue Support Grant settlement (RSG) which sets out central government funding for local authorities in 2008/9on Thursday last week. The level of funding is a major factor in determining council tax bills.
"We have to do things differently and that's why we are planning to cut council tax by probably the biggest amount in Britain for the second year in a row," Cllr Greenhalgh added.
Hammersmith and Fulham Council says it has achieved substantial savings by competitively tendering council services, cutting waste and bureaucracy and by introducing new ways of smarter working.
The council says it has saved
· £1.1million from streamlined human resources services and increased productivity
· £1million from reduced debt repayments
· £539,000 from providing services on-line and other customer access improvements
· £468,000 from reduction in office space
· £625,000 from market-testing services
· £150,000 from reducing energy consumption
Around £90 million worth of services are being market tested in a bid to reduce the cost to taxpayers. "We expect this to yield up to £5 million of efficiency savings without impacting frontline services," said Councillor Greenhalgh.
For example, grounds maintenance for parks and open spaces is to be awarded to Quadron, saving up to £200,000. The council claims this will bring about improvements to grass cutting, tree maintenance, weeding and the planting of shrubs and bulbs.
Meanwhile, more than £4million has been saved in agency costs, reducing the budget from £24million to £19.6million. In fact, the very first cost saving move was to cut personal advisers to Cabinet Members - at an immediate saving of over £300,000 a year.
This week the Taxpayers' Alliance highlighted Hammersmith and Fulham as an example for other local authorities to follow by reducing expenditure on communications.
The authority spent £669,000 on publicity in 2006/7 - down 11 per cent from the £751.000 spent 10 years ago. However, Labour MP for Ealing, Acton and Shepherd's Bush, Andy Slaughter, has criticised the Conservative-run council for failing to find cheaper contractors to clean the borough's streets.
The borough refuse collection, street cleansing and grounds maintenance services are to be outsourced, but the bids so far have proved more expensive than the current service.
Mr Slaughter said: "I was recently shown the text of a letter from the Director of Environment at Hammersmith and Fulham Council to Council employees.
This letter explains to long-standing council staff who are likely to lose their jobs cleaning the streets and emptying our bins that the bids to do the work are more expensive than the current service so there will be a delay in getting rid of them while the council lowers the quality of the service to make it cheaper."
December 14, 2007