Liberal Democrat Budget Amendments - Children & Young People

Speech by Cllr Janet Godden delivered to Council on Tue 9th Feb 2010

Within the limited flexibility that we have, the priorities for the Liberal Democrat group are services for children & young people; services for the elderly and road and pavement maintenance.

With regard to Children & young people I'd like to make three points:

1. We think this an unfortunate time to be cutting funding to children's centres. In the first place the work of children's centres is an important first step in preparing young children for school. With the problems we have with educational attainment this is an contradictory area to look for savings. In the second place, the first infants to pass through the first Sure Start centres in the late '90s are now entering their teens and it will be interesting to correlate some of these figures against youth offending rates in a few years time; early signs are positive. Children's centres are a success story; more are needed, not less. It's worrying that the Council does not appear to have the ear of Mr Phil Willis who announces that a Tory government would pare back spending on children's centres. It is surprising that the Labour group seems not to be putting its money where its mouth so often is and has not a word to say about this cuts. Our budget puts £250k into expanding the work of children's centres.

2. We have not taken the Administration's proposed cut of £200k in respite services for children with disabilities. These services were streamlined to provide better value for money with the joint organisation with Barnados a few years ago. Since then pressures have started rising again and we do not think a further cut possible without resulting in a counter-productive overspend in a Directorate which is already overspending.

3. We are putting more into the youth service, where the Tory budget has a cut of £350k over years 3 to 5. If ever a service has been reviewed and reorganised to death it is the youth service. We have no faith in yet another review producing genuinely better and cheaper ways of working instead of further cuts. The expression 'back office' in the Tory budget is an unfortunate one: it demeans many people's jobs, and if essential services are working properly front-line and support functions are equally important. We are not taking this cut. We also propose to invest £155k in more youth outreach workers. Not every area has a youth centre; the Chill Out fund with its emphasis on matched funding tends not to reach parishes that are neither rich enough to provide matched funding themselves nor poor enough to attract partnership grants that serve the sane purpose. The targeted work of the outreach workers is essential, and we are funding five more posts.

Real choice, low taxes and value for money - that's what the Liberal Democrat amendments offer this Council.