Councillors have passed a budget focussed on 鈥榞etting the basics right鈥� and making Edinburgh a 鈥榗leaner and greener city鈥�.
Following a series of votes on Thursday (23 February), the were agreed, as was the Administration’s .
While rejecting a series of savings proposals in education and speech and language therapy, councillors agreed to allocate substantial additional money to improve roads, paths and pavements and carry out additional resurfacing works for the long term.
Additional funding will also be made available for the city’s parks and greenspaces, tackling fly tipping, graffiti removal and street sweeping, and additional resource for flood defences and gully cleaning in light of the increasing impacts of climate change.
The Climate and Sustainability Team will also be bolstered, enabling a greater focus on the city’s ambition of becoming net zero by 2030.
As proposed by all political groups, the much-loved King’s Theatre will also benefit from funding to secure its future, with £3m set aside.
Council Leader Cammy Day said:
Despite the unique demands of a Capital city, Edinburgh continues to receive the worst grant funding of any local authority in Scotland. Years of local government cuts have now come to a head, forcing us to find close to £80m of savings this year – on top of the hundreds of millions we’ve made already. It’s a position none of us wanted to be in and our residents deserve better. Despite this, we presented a positive, fair and responsible set of proposals, aimed at protecting vital frontline services on which our communities and residents rightly depend. So, I was deeply disappointed we didn’t secure the backing from other groups, particularly in the manner in which it came about. But, for all that, I remain absolutely committed to leading this council and to working with all other groups to deliver the best for the people of Edinburgh.
Liberal Democrat Group Leader Cllr Kevin Lang said:
I’m delighted that our budget got support from councillors – and that, in the midst of the cost of living crisis, we’ve been able to limit the rise in council tax to 5% for Edinburgh’s residents. This is a Council budget that delivers. A budget that stops £5 million of education cuts, injects £11 million extra to tackle our broken roads and pavements, more investment for parks and new money for climate change action. Despite continued funding cuts from the Scottish Government, residents still rightly expect high quality local services in return for the increasing amounts of council tax they pay each year, which requires a budget which focuses on essential core services, delivered well.
Council Tax Bands
A £965.13
B £1,125.98
C £1,286.84
D £1,447.69
E £1,902.10
F £2,352.50
G £2,835.06
H £3,546.84