Thursday’s meeting was the Revenue & Resources Committee. I’m not a member of this Committee so I can talk but not vote.

After the Amenities Committee two weeks ago, Revenue and Resources now adds the rest of the budget to go to full Council on Dec 6th. The budget proposed by the officers would lead to about a 5% increase on this year’s precept of £791,980. Conservative Councillors went through paring £500 off here and there, £1000 off grants, £5000 off provision for Station House. There was a proposal to cut in half the “climate change” budget item which is to implement energy saving and other measures. Last May the Conservatives election leaflet said “Conservative Town Councillors recognize that the town needs to take a lead in Green issues and have set a budget for this”. Despite this the proposed cut went to a vote with 4 votes for the cut and 4 against it. I didn’t have a vote but added my view that the Town Council should indeed take a lead. The Chair of the Committee, Cllr Peter Roberts, had to use his casting vote to keep his Committee to their commitment! 

The other major controversy was whether to keep the same level of budget next year for the August High Street Festival and the Christmas Lights event. The Committee had already taken a decision to employ a consultant to do a small amount of work on an independent review of services. The first thought on the Festivals was to leave the budget in and have this consultant consider the value of the expenditure. But then it was decided that Councillors could take a decision and if it was to reduce expenditure, it could be included in the budget. So a working party is to meet and make recommendations in time to take to a special Council meeting in January. As the only opposition member I will join 4 other Councillors. My thoughts at the moment are that I would want to keep the festivals but move from employing professional entertainers to encouraging more town organizations to put on demonstrations. And we can see how the Christmas event goes this year with some rearrangement of stalls and the carols back in the High Street by the tree. This year the spend for street entertainment in the summer was about £9000 and for Christmas the budget is £7,750, but this does include stage and sound equipment. What do you think?