Dumfries and Galloway’s council tax rise has been pegged at three per cent despite the feeling of many elected members that it should have been higher.
The Labour/SNP administration proposed the below inflation figure in light of the current economic climate facing the region’s residents.
Council leader Elaine Murray insisted: “This is not the time to raise council tax by any significant amount.”
At Tuesday’s annual budget setting meeting, the council rubber-stamped the three per cent rise which will come into effect from April.
However, that is two per cent lower than the rate of inflation and the region’s council tax level is still also well below the national average.
With the council being forced into a raft of cutbacks to plug a £5m funding gap, several councillors asked why the rise was not higher this year.
Socialist councillor Tommy Sloan said: “We have said in recent years that there should have been better increases in council tax.
“But the Scottish Government was telling us, ‘no, let’s have a council tax freeze’.
“If we hadn’t had those council tax freezes, we wouldn’t have the problem we’ve got today.”
Independent Councillor Jane Maitland said: “I’m in agreement with the Socialist group that we’ve not raised council tax sufficiently high.
“As an independent grouping, we felt probably that the council tax should be raised in order to provide the level of investment the people are seeking.
“We are seven per cent below the national average in council tax, I really think we’ve got to change that.”
Dr Murray replied: “If we had council tax at the same level as the national average, we would have covered our spending gap.
“But energy bills are going through the roof, fuel is going up, food prices are going up. This is not the time to raise council tax by any significant amount.”
The council was initially facing a spending gap of £8.5m due to a financial settlement from the Scottish Government which did not include money to cover staff pay awards, national insurance increases, inflation or resources for meeting climate change targets.
This was brought down to just over £5m after an additional £3.4m was received from Holyrood after complaints from every Scottish council leader and the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. However, the extra cash is a one-off for 2022/23.
The budget setting meeting was straightforward as only the Labour/SNP administration tabled a budget.
The opposition Conservative group insisted that they were putting their energies into the upcoming local elections, while the Liberal Democrats, Socialists and independent elected members also chose not to table their suggestions for running council services over the next year.
The administration has managed to balance the books through making £2.771m in savings and implementing the three per cent council tax increase.
Cutbacks include reducing supply teaching costs, the removal of a few job vacancies which have not been filled, savings on office accommodation, IT and connectivity charges, not progressing on some of the capital investment programme, and the use of technology to save on travel costs.
Meanwhile, commitments to invest in tackling nuisance seagulls and the introduction of more cash for foster parents will be kept.
Due to the poor public transport system in the region, there will be an increase in funding to transport partnership Swestrans for three additional posts to develop and deliver a new public transport model.
Meanwhile, an extra £370,000 will go towards boosting the council’s anti-poverty efforts.
