The Greenwich Wire has been the only news outlet to examine Greenwich Council’s plans to cut £33 million from next year’s budget. MATT HARTLEY, the leader of the council’s Conservative opposition, has his say on what the Labour town hall is offering.
This year the Labour councillors who run Greenwich Council are bringing forward a Budget that will see cuts to library opening hours, children’s centres, school crossing patrols and money taken from the pockets of those on the lowest incomes – all told, around £6 million in cuts that people in our borough are going to notice, and feel.
Despite what you’ll hear from those Labour councillors – as always, far more keen to talk about Westminster, than their own decisions in Woolwich – government funding for Greenwich Council is rising. There’s a further £15 million increase in government funding this year, bringing the total increase to £55 million since 2019.
But despite this increased funding, like all councils, Greenwich is experiencing significant demand and cost pressures. The council needs to find £33.7 million in savings in the coming year to balance its budget.
As leader of the opposition, I’ve spent the last month buried in the detail of how the Labour administration is proposing to close that £33.7 million gap.
I’ve already mentioned its planned £6 million in cuts – many of which will cause real worry and concern. A further £1.8 million will come from increased charges and income.
But the vast majority of these savings – about £26 million over this next year – are in fact non-frontline efficiency savings that, by Labour’s own admission, will have no impact on residents. Many of these savings could have been made years ago. You’ll hear less about this £26 million, because it represents an abject admission of failure from the same Labour councillors who have spent more than a decade denying that efficiencies were possible.
Over that time, Greenwich Labour has voted against every attempt to tackle inefficiency. They have repeatedly ignored my warnings over wasteful spending across the council. It’s only now, in 2024, that Labour has been forced to finally get serious about this.
I have published a detailed analysis of Greenwich Labour’s new budget – in which you can read for yourself, in the council’s own words, how these £26 million in efficiency savings will, variously, have “no impact on residents”, “no discernible impact”, and no “impact on service delivery”.
They include efficiencies that will save hundreds of thousands of pounds a year by “optimising performance”, “reducing unnecessary cost”, and “streamlining internal processes”.
Others will “deliver efficiencies based on a reduction in agency spend” and “reduce headcount without compromising performance” through “more effective working arrangements”. Millions will be saved by delivering “improved outcomes for residents”, “improved quality and value for money” and a “positive impact for service users”.
These are not my words, but the words of Labour’s own proposals. By failing to do the hard work early on, Greenwich Labour has wasted millions of pounds of council taxpayers’ money. That money is now lost forever.
This matters now because of the decisions ahead, and the lesson this sorry tale should teach for the future. If Labour councillors had acted sooner, then the other difficult decisions they are now facing – on children’s centres, libraries and the rest of their £6 million cuts next year, for a start – would be far less difficult.
I’m worried the lesson still hasn’t been learned. For example, at the same time as choosing to cut services, the administration still stubbornly refuses to even consider sharing back-office functions with other councils. There are even more efficiencies that could and should be made before cutting services.
Worse still, the council’s latest Labour leader, Anthony Okereke, is actually making these problems even larger – by refusing to reverse the vanity spending he introduced in his first budget a year ago.
We will soon see the final print edition of Greenwich Info (how instructive it is to look at the last items they choose to cut). But the taxpayer is still stuck with Cllr Okereke’s costly decision to expand his communications team – tasked with putting out PR videos and glossy consultations to supposedly “engage”, from a council that most residents feel does anything but. And he seems intent on pressing on with his plan to hire a taxpayer-funded political assistant – a serious misjudgement.
Politics is about choices, so I am giving Labour councillors a clear choice on Wednesday with my opposition budget proposals this year.
They can vote to continue to waste taxpayer funds on their communications and PR spending, or they can vote for my fully-costed amendment to continue to fund Greenwich Supports Advice Hubs and top up the emergency support scheme for our borough’s most vulnerable residents. The choice should be an easy one.
Matt Hartley is the leader of the opposition on Greenwich Council, and a Conservative councillor for Mottingham, Coldharbour and New Eltham ward.
Anthony Okereke, the council leader, has also written about Greenwich’s budget plans.
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