A political row has broken out following Warrington Borough Council Budget meeting, which approved a 2.98 pc council tax rise, after the controlling Labour group presented a Tory alternative, based on a tax freeze.
Lib Dems have also weighed in describing the meeting as a “farce” after Labour councillors presented an alternative budget, aiming to give local Conservatives the opportunity to honour their 2021 Local Election promises.
“Last year, the Tories promised they’d freeze Council Tax and pull the plug on our profit-making investment portfolio,” said Deputy Leader of the Council, Cllr Cathy Mitchell (Lab).
“But ever since then, they’ve refused to present a legal alternative budget for Warrington’s finances.
So last night, we gave them the opportunity to support their own pledges. It’s beyond time that local people see what the reality of a Conservative Council would be.”
Leader of the Council, Cllr Russ Bowden (Lab), said: “A Conservative Council in Warrington would have to make an additional £39.3 million in cuts in order to implement their own manifesto pledges and present a legal budget,”
“We outlined what they’d need to cut to make their budget legal — and the result isn’t pretty at all.”
The legal alternative budget, developed by Warrington Labour Group, demonstrates how a Warrington Conservative Council would have to close ten of Warrington’s libraries, and increase all Council fees and fines by 50%.
It includes the closure of all of Warrington’s community centres, cutting half of the town’s highway maintenance budget, taking PCSOs off the streets, ending the removal of fly-tipped waste and moving to monthly bin collections, with a yearly charge of £50 for a green bin.
But even all that would only save £12 million — a third of the cuts the Conservatives would need to make to balance the budget under their manifesto promises.
At the vote, Warrington Tories responded with abstentions and ‘no comment’ on the alternative budget amendment, while voting against the Labour Council’s budget. Labour’s budget passed by 41 votes to 10.
Cllr Bowden concluded: “A Conservative budget would make Warrington a less prosperous, less safe and less pleasant place to live. It’s no wonder the Conservatives can’t face up to supporting their own pie-in-the-sky election pledges once they’re brought into the real world.”
“The Council’s Invest-to-Save portfolio brings in around £25 million a year in income, which shields vital services from national Tory cuts. If the Conservatives can’t say where they’d get the money from otherwise, how can they criticise our investment strategy?”
“This Labour Council is serious about preserving Warrington’s services and delivering prosperity for the people of our town, in the face of government austerity.
“The Conservatives on the Council, backed up online by boring naysayers, just play politics by promising things they know they can’t deliver. We’d again invite the Tories to submit their own balanced budget. But until they do, the people of Warrington have our version of it.”
But the opposition Tories accused the controlling labour group of a “Farcical Stunt Which Disrupted a Crucial Council Budget Debate.”
Replying to the budget on behalf of the Conservative Opposition, Councillor Ken Critchley (Con) concluded his 15-minute speech by saying: “This budget is a budget of financial smoke and mirrors, it simply lacks credibility.”
“It is unthinkable that the Conservative Group could support a budget that punishes the hard-working people of Warrington with this maximum council tax charge, to bail out this failing Labour Administration.”
“We believe that there should be no increase in Council Tax for 2022/23.”
After two hours of continuing debate and without any prior notice, Labour then tabled an amendment to their own budget, even though they were not intending to support it, and produced an associated two-page document purporting to be a Conservative budget. Conservatives described the document as “misrepresentative and financially illiterate”.
Today, Conservatives are slamming Labour for a completely unacceptable stunt. A Conservative spokesperson said that “rather than focusing on producing a budget for the residents of Warrington, Labour seemed set on wasting time with silly political games. This is a ridiculous attempt to confuse the electorate with a fake opposition budget.”
“As a result of Labour’s unacceptable and incoherent actions, the crucial budget debate descended into farce and was suspended for several minutes.“
“Labour admitted that the dubious document had been prepared last week but still felt it was appropriate to bring Warrington Council into disrepute by proposing an amendment and vote on such an important topic without any notice whatsoever.”
“Labour’s actions at last night’s Council demonstrate their contempt for the people of Warrington and their lack of respect for Council Members.“
Kath Buckley, Conservative Group Leader, condemned Labour’s actions. “This was the most disreputable behaviour that I have witnessed at Full Council since being elected seven years ago.”
“Labour’s actions last night were clearly designed to distract from their serious budget failings which have seen Labour accumulate over £1.6Bn of debt, fail to secure sign-off of their statutory accounts for four years and put residents’ money at risk through their investment in the failed Together Energy company.”
Liberal Democrat Group Leader Cllr Bob Barr said, “My Group accepts there is no scope for choices in this budget. We praise officers for constructing a legal budget that protects services as far as possible. It is not at all obvious that the governing Labour Group had any real input into the budget and they appear to have accepted all the officer recommendations.
We put forward an amendment that would have given every householder living in a Band A to D house a cost-of-living rebate of £15. While not much, this rebate would have been the equivalent of half of the increase of 1.98% levied by the Council. It would have cost £1 million from reserves and benefited over 77,000 households.”
Labour voted against this rebate but promised to talk to Liberal Democrats about how a similar sum could be used to soften the impact of massive cost of living increases on those with the lowest incomes in Warrington.
Deputy Group Leader Cllr Ryan Bate added, “A meeting that had started in a sombre mood recognising the crisis in Ukraine turned into a shouting match between Conservatives and Labour. In these difficult times we should have had a consensus on how the Council’s finances can be managed. More collaboration and transparency are needed. Instead, our Group was disappointed and bemused as we watched this important meeting descend into farce.”
Since 2021, Warrington Tories have promised a council tax freeze & ending commercial investments but amazingly never account for where their £39m of cuts would fall…
So tonight, we wrote an alternative budget to deliver their promises…
Surprisingly, they didn’t vote for it! pic.twitter.com/rk5ueiY0Hh
— Cllr Russ Bowden (@CllrRussBowden) February 28, 2022
