Highland Council leadership passes budget unchanged despite serious challenges

Highland Council has agreed its £602 million budget unchanged despite serious concerns from councillors that the proposals lacked details and posed risks to breaking-even at the end of the financial year.

The three year “savings plan and investment” concerns the revenue side of the budget – effectively funding services – rather than infrastructure investment, which was agreed in September of last year.

But members will have to wait until March to learn the details of where those cuts and investments will fall when a “programme of work and performance measures to deliver the savings and investment” will be revealed.

There were two major challenges to the plans set out by the SNP-Independent administration.

The first from the Liberal Democrat group called for £50 million more investment – £30 million for roads and a further £20 million to build a new St Clement’s Special School in Dingwall. That was defeated 41 to 24 with one abstention.

And the administration won a second bid from Cllr Chris Baldry to keep planned education changes – though this remains an area of doubt – to reduce principal teachers by 70 by returning them to regular teaching roles.

That means the administration passed a package of £55 million in savings as part of a three-year strategy to manage an estimated £113 million budget gap with £26 million of those to come in 2024/25.

Council Tax has been frozen after the Scottish Government funded the equivalent of a 4.6 per cent hike with almost £7 million and controversial reforms of adult social care were also accepted.

Leader of the Council Raymond Bremner said: “I am pleased that, today, members have approved a three year financial plan which is the best possible strategy for dealing with scale of the financial context.

“Many of the ideas for savings and redesign came from engagement with our staff and the public and this has helped us shape our proposals. The plan agreed today allows for significant investment to take place and protect jobs across our communities. Work is underway now on the operational delivery of the budget, plans for which will be reported to the March Council.”

Convener Bill Lobban said: “This plan today signals the start of significant activity to deliver the savings and improvements. Redesign is fundamental to supporting the necessary transformation in order to redesign our services, maximise our income generation and release longer term, sustainable savings.”

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