Start of consultation: 06/07/2012
End of consultation: 06/08/2012
Background:
In recent years the council's budget has been curbed significantly, following a sizeable reduction in government grant funding over four years from 2011/12 to 2014/15.
This left the council with a £33m projected funding gap after allowing for the reduction in government grant, increasing demands on services and increasing inflation. Frontloading of the government grant reduction meant that 80% of the savings had to be found in 2011/12 and 2012/13. In addition, government funding was made available to local authorities to freeze council tax. Whilst this ensured Island households did not face an increase in the Isle of Wight Council element of their council tax, it did limit the council’s ability to increase revenue to fund services. As a result of all of this, the budget consultations over recent years have focused principally on the need to make savings, whilst allowing for some modest amounts of new investment, where affordable.
Consultation activity:
Many of you have shared your views with us and you have also told us that you think future consultations need to offer the whole council budget rather than just specific savings options, so this year we have decided to do things differently.
There are two parts to our online budget consultation:
Part 1: A budget simulator in which you can see a full list of services, what they do for the community and what they spend. You can indicate by increasing or decreasing the budget allocation what is important to you and where you think our spending priorities should be for 2013-14. You can also make your own suggestions for saving money and can see what impact your decisions have on council tax levels.
Part 2: There is also a separate on-line budget survey which gives you an opportunity to comment on some of the ideas and suggestions we have for further investment or savings. This is included separately as the budget simulator template (which is provided to local authorities free of charge by yougov) has some restrictions in the way it is presented but we would also really appreciate your views on these.
Please complete both the budget simulator and the survey.
To use the budget simulator please click here.
To complete the online budget survey click here.
This is just one part of a wider consultation exercise which is taking place across the Island and which also involves budget workshops with different community representatives eg businesses, unions, voluntary and community groups, town and parish councillors, ward councillors and council staff.
Your comments are of value to us and will be used to inform the council's decisions about its budget for the next financial year. A full report of the outcome of this consultation will be included in the papers for cabinet and full council covering the council's medium-term financial strategy this September and will be published on this website as soon as it is available.
Page last updated on: 10/07/2012
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