Brighton and Hove City Council budget round-up

The final vote came after six and a half hours of debate and wrangling at Hove Town Hall over the council’s £1.1 billion spending bill for the coming financial year.

Councillors debated ways to spend £117,000 from extra grant funding and how to raise money by making cuts and savings that could fund services previously threatened with the axe.

A cross-party deal included elements from amendments proposed by Conservatives, Independents, Greens and Labour.

The deal secured funding to save the Youth Arts programme, reversed proposals to fine children who were late returning library books and stopped cuts to youth-led grants, paid placements and “supported employment”.

Councillor Tom Druitt proposed the budget and said that fellow Green councillors had worked hard to prioritise youth services and support for vulnerable people when putting together the balanced budget.

He said: “We have done our very best to safeguard as many of these services as possible – and the budget I am presenting today is far less painful than the draft presented in December.

“However, it is still painful, and we stand in solidarity with anyone affected adversely, whether they are our valued staff or residents in the city we love.

“Your struggle is our struggle, and we call on the government to address the crisis in local authority funding before there is nothing left of these services at all.”

Labour secured Conservative backing for a proposal to fund Visit Brighton, Volk’s Railway and lifeguard services by deferring £60,000 set aside to fund the removal of diseased trees.

Councillor Druitt said that there was not enough money in the diseased tree removal budget as it was – and taking out £60,000 risked the spread of elm disease and ash dieback across the city.

Labour pushed through a £1.1 million cut to the Hanover and Tarner Low Traffic Neighbourhood (LTN) scheme to invest in refurbishing public toilets.

Councillor Druitt reminded councillors of an email that they had received before the meeting from an Elm Grove resident.

The resident wrote that people along her street and Queen’s Park Road and Egremont Place had asked for more trees and more crossing points ahead of the proposed LTN pilot.

When the cut was voted through, there were cries of “shame on you” from the Green side of the council chamber.

The joint leader of the Labour opposition, Councillor Carmen Appich, said: “Our amendment is all about maintaining basic and visitor services – not steamrolling ahead with a local Green vanity project.

“We are looking to improve the restoration and refurbishment of the public toilets along our seafront and in our parks.

“We are also reviewing the planned cuts to our beloved Volk’s Railway and the Visit Brighton volunteer service.

“Toilet closures and the other cuts would have a disproportionate impact not just on public health but also on the visitor footfall in the city which we really want to avoid.”

The Conservatives proposed only one amendment to the budget – to reinstate the youth-led grants programme using the extra £117,000 grant funding.

Councillor Alistair McNair criticised the current and previous administrations – Green and Labour – for being high-spending and high-taxing, saying that they had raised council tax by almost 50 per cent during the past 10 years.

He said: “These 10 years of higher-than-average council tax rises under Green-Labour administrations have left Brighton and Hove on the verge of being designated a ‘very high taxing council’ by the UK Council Tax index.

“According to the index, Brighton and Hove City Council comes in at 303rd out of 362 UK local authorities in a ranking of lowest to highest-taxing councils in 2022-23.

“If the budget goes through tonight, with its maximum 5 per cent council tax increase, I have no doubt that Brighton and Hove will move into the very high taxing category.

“Whatever way you look at it, Brighton and Hove City Council is not performing well on keeping council tax manageable compared to almost every other council across the UK.”

Independent councillor Anne Pissaridou failed to win backing to save Mile Oak Library and abstained from voting on the final budget proposals.

Another Independent councillor, Bridget Fishleigh, failed to secure support for more CCTV (closed-circuit television) cameras to monitor fly-tipping.

She voted against the budget and questioned why the council could not use some of its reserves to mitigate the increase in council tax – because “the rainy day is here”.

Having set up a food bank in Saltdean, Councillor Fishleigh said that she knew that working people on low wages were struggling to afford higher bills.

The Conservatives backed a cross-party deal to secure funding for various services but then voted against the budget proposals and council tax increase. They were passed by 35 votes to 13, with one abstention.

The 4.99 per cent council tax increase includes a ringfenced 2 per cent increase for adult social care services which are a continuing pressure on council budgets as demand and costs increase.

The council’s net “general fund” budget, used to run most day-to-day services, is £232 million for 2023-24. Capital funding approved for next year is £212 million.

This budget includes £88 million for new housing, including temporary accommodation purchases and conversions, the New Homes for Neighbourhoods programme and the home purchase scheme.

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Regeneration projects, including Madeira Terraces, Black Rock, Valley Gardens and the Royal Pavilion Estate, have a capital investment programme totalling £27.5 million.

A total of £17.6 million has been set aside for sustainability and carbon reduction, including the warmer homes fund, street lighting, the bike share scheme, liveable neighbourhoods and the Carbon Neutral 2030 fund.

The Housing Revenue account budget includes a capital programme of £57.7 million.

The council’s element of the council tax bill for an average band D home will rise by £89.60 from £1,794.03 to £1,883.63. Out of this increase, £35.82 relates to the adult social care precept.

Sussex Police’s precept for a typical band D council tax property should be £239.91 – up £15 from £224.91 in the current financial year.

The East Sussex Fire Authority precept should add £104.37 to an average band D council tax bill in Brighton and Hove – up £5 from £99.37 this year.

In all, two people or more in a band D property in Brighton and Hove can expect their council tax to rise by 5.2 per cent or £109.60 from £2,118.31 to £2,227.91. This equates to £185.66 a month from April.