Sign up your support for a people's budget
Letter from SSP councillor Jim Bollan
An appeal to all trade unions, community, tenants’ and pensioners’ organisations
SIGN UP YOUR SUPPORT FOR A PEOPLE’S BUDGET
No to ANY cuts in West Dunbartonshire – fight for the funds to save all jobs and services
Dear friends, brothers, sisters,
We face the worst cuts to vital services, housing, jobs, pay, benefits and pensions in several generations.
The Tory-Lib Dem Coalition doesn’t even have a mandate to create havoc in Scotland: 85% of Scots voted anti-Tory.
The Scottish government should be standing up for the people of Scotland, defying Westminster’s cuts.
West Dunbartonshire Council should champion the needs of local people and refuse to axe jobs, services and community resources.
As the local Scottish Socialist Party councillor, I refuse to vote for a single cut. Why should sick people, pensioners, kids, the disabled, unemployed, or our council workers pay for the naked greed of the bankers?
The West Dunbartonshire Council leadership plan to put forward a draft budget in mid-December, with further cuts rumoured at £10m – which would mean untold misery for local people. And they plan a shameless con-trick, saying they will “consult” the unions and local communities over the Christmas season before fixing their final Budget! What a sham!
I am writing to ask your organisation – and you as an individual – to support an alternative Budget – a No-Cuts budget, a People’s Budget, which I intend to present to the Council meeting and fight for.
Last year (2010-11) the full Budget was £250m. Inflation is officially 4.6% … and we all know it is higher on the daily necessities that hard-pressed families and workers spend most of their income on. That also takes no account of the rise in VAT to 20% in January.
The SNP government in Holyrood is now threatening a 5.3% cut in the funds they allocate to West Dunbartonshire Council, which would amount to over £10m of a cut in our Council’s funding compared with last year.
A People’s Budget means not a penny less on jobs, services, or facilities than we had last year. In many ways it is far too modest, because we need improvements, investment, to enhance people’s lives; but as a bare minimum we should defend what we had.
So I am proposing next year’s Budget should be at least the previous £250m, plus £12m to account for current inflation. That would restore recent, vicious cuts passed by the SNP Council, and allow us to at least stand still.
If, as they are threatening, the SNP government cuts grants by over £10m in WDC, that would mean a shortfall of at least £22m in round figures.
So I ask that you sign up your support for a People’s Budget – with total spending of £262m to defend what we had – and join a broad campaign to demand the £22m off Holyrood to balance the Council’s books.
If they can afford £1.3trillion in handouts to the banks; further handouts to the Irish banks; and if the Scottish government can spend £250m on private consultants in next year’s Budget, surely £22m to protect an impoverished area like ours is hardly asking for the earth?
There IS an alternative to the brutal cuts. The Scottish government should defy the Westminster butchers. They should put forward an emergency Bill in the parliament to scrap and replace the unfair Council Tax with an income-based Scottish Service Tax, which latest figures prove could raise £1.6bn MORE than next year’s Council Tax, whilst 80% of people would pay LESS for local services.
West Dunbartonshire Council should defy Holyrood’s cuts and set a People’s Budget, based on needs, not cuts to bail out the bankers – and demand the funds to defend every job and service.
We need to unite and fight NOW, before it’s too late. Every union branch, shop steward, community group, tenants’ organisation, pensioners’ group, and individuals across the area should add your name to this proposal – and lobby your local councillors in support of this People’s Budget.
Please sign up your support TODAY – and let me know.
If you want to meet to discuss the proposal, ask any questions, or raise any doubts, please get in touch to arrange a meeting.
Yours in struggle,
Jim Bollan, Scottish Socialist Party councillor for Leven