£15.7 million potential loss to Hounslow
The leader of Hounslow Council, Cllr Jagdish Sharma, is calling on local MPs Mary Macleod and Alan Keen to help protect vital local services.
Cllr Sharma has written to them to voice concerns over proposed changes to the way council receives funding from the Government that could cost the borough £15.7 million a year.
He is also asking for their help in pressing the Government for a replacement to the Building Schools for the Future scheme which would have provided £86 million to improve local school buildings.
At the moment, Hounslow, along with 23 other London borough’s receives protection from significant loss to funding from the Government. Locally this is worth £14 million, and this could be removed or drastically reduced.
Hounslow also faces losing a further £1.7 million from proposed reductions in adjustments made to compensate areas with higher labour costs. Across London this is expected to cost councils £100 million.
Cllr Sharma said:
“We are planning for the cuts to come - although we won’t know what these will be until later in the year - but these proposals would have a disproportionate effect on Hounslow, and the people who live here.
“We have raised our concerns with the Government department responsible for funding councils, but we also want our local MPs to use whatever influence they have to help protect us from ill-thought out cuts.”
Next week (20 October), the Government will announce the results of Comprehensive Spending Review which sets out how much Government departments will have to spend over the next three years. This is followed at the end of November/early December by the announcement of the Revenue Support Grant. This tells councils exactly how much money they can expect to receive from central Government, which makes up around 75 per cent of Hounslow’s budget.
October 14, 2010
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