Cllr Lloyd Harris

At the full council meeting the Conservative Administration denied that the budget process for the coming year was delayed but admitted that the first chance opposition members would have to see it will be in February.
Cllr Denise Rance, Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group and Official Opposition, questioned the Leader of the Council who could not bring himself to admit that scrutiny of the budget had been removed from all committee meetings in the autumn, and often with little notice.
Cllr Rance said “I am concerned that this is a tactic being used by the Conservatives to prevent effective scrutiny of their budget and to hide cuts to services.”
She continued “in previous years, the budget process has had a timetable which began in August when papers were distributed.  In October the scrutiny process would begin with comments being examined in January.  The budget is then discussed at Council in February when it is invariably approved by the leading group.”
“We are now in January and still the budget has not been put before scrutiny committees and I consider this to be a delay”.