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Tacking a £12 million reduction would need 12% cuts or savings.

 

Mr Emmott highlighted the “considerable uncertainty” over Scottish Government funding for councils over the coming period with the “likelihood of further reductions” offset by ring-fenced funding for new schemes.

 

An initiative by council leader Roddie Mackay to establish a budget board has been backed by councillors.

 

The budget board will constantly examine financial issues and regularly consult with community groups.

 

Council bosses are drawing up outline five year plans, indicating where savings can be made by changing the way services are delivered.

 

The human resources department - which deals with the authority‘s workforce - will “develop costed options” to contribute to the council’s budget strategy.

 

Leader Roddie Mackay said: “We are setting up a budget board for the first time with the basic aim of looking at budgets much earlier in the life of the council which will also to involve every ward.”

 

The objective is for “consultation and information to become commonplace.”

 

This is to avoid having last minute consultation meetings about cuts just before the final budget is known when councillors may be “under pressure to make decisions.”

 

Mr Mackay said: “Sometimes that is too late to influence things and I’d rather the council takes much more informed decisions - and the community knows what coming ahead of them - early on in the process.”

 

One councillor from each of the nine island wards will sit on the budget board and it is their “duty to feed back” to a grassroots forum such as a community council or local association.

 

In a two-way flow of information, councillors are also asked to advise the budget board about their community’s priorities and highlight which services are perceived as the most important.

 

“It’s a good idea in terms of community involvement. We hope it leads to people being more informed and that decision making in the council is much more thought through in terms of what local people want,” he said.

 

Though the amount of future council funding from the Scottish Government is presently unknown, Mr Mackay pointed out: “At the minute it looks like we will receive a lot less money than before.”

 

The council will press the government for more cash for building, roads and infrastructure projects which has a “disproportionally large effect” in the islands compared to the central belt.

 

The far more “striking” impact means more jobs for islanders and additional money being spent in the local economy, so building projects are a “very, very important feature of life in the Western Isles,” said Mr Mackay.

 

 

 

Savings of up to £20 million may be required in the Western Isles over the next few years, councillors have been warned.

 

In a report, the council’s finance director, Robert Emmott, said the forward budget projections anticipate that savings in the region of £12 million could be required over the next two year period or up to £20 million by 2022-23.

 

Protection of care services, the need to maintain teacher numbers, and fixed financing costs means “all other services could be required to make savings of 43% to achieve £20 million.”

Comhairle may face making £20 million savings

25 June 2017