Budget shortfall of £90,000 revealed by Arun District Council

The council’s environment committee approved its revenue and capital budgets proposals for 2024/25 at its meeting on Tuesday, January 23, seeing the committee drawing £90,000 from the council’s reserves to fund a budget shortfall.

The proposed budget will now go to the policy and finance committee for final approval and inclusion in the total ADC budget for 2024/25.

The council’s previously approved financial strategy identified roughly £543,000 worth of savings in the committee’s budget, with most coming from £230,000 in additional car park income, and £60,000 from an increase in cemetery fees.

Freddie Tandy (Lab, Courtwick with Toddington) said members wanted ‘more information’ on implications of budget cuts and savings, saying he was told members would have input on determining cemetery fees but had not had that input before coming to approve this budget.

He said: “I’m just really quite worried that this is being done in a quite back to front way, and that we’re budgeting for a cemetery fee increase that hasn’t even come to the committee.”

At full council on January 10, members unanimously approved a motion to ‘provide all members full details of all proposed cost savings’ for the upcoming budget.

Shaun Gunner (Con, Rustington East) said this motion showed members wanted more information about the consequences of cuts and savings made in the budget before making decisions about them – asking the council to ‘never’ conduct a budget this way again.

A cut of £46,000 to the council’s foreshore teams caused concern for members, as details of how this would affect the service were not outlined in the budget report.

Billy Blanchard-Cooper (LDem, Beach) said no information was given in the report about which hours were being cut for the foreshore teams, but that he had confidence in officers and the budget process.

He said: “If we could just have details as and when they’re available so we have got that bit of chance to come up with slight alternatives.

“At the moment we’re agreeing to this without the details which leaves me a little bit uneasy, but I have got confidence that [officers] are trying to make sure the right decision is made as much as possible.”

Phillipa Bower (Con, East Preston) said since the committee had to draw from the council’s reserves, it still needed to make more cuts to its services.

She said: “As I see it we haven’t really made enough cuts at all if we’re still [taking] £90,000 out of reserves, which are there for emergencies. We should be making more cuts not being sorry for the cuts we are making.

The council’s head of finance, Antony Baden, said he agreed the committee needed to make more savings, but inflation on ‘big ticket’ contracts like cleansing services and parks had seen a large increase in costs.