Council plea to help find savings
SHETLAND Islands Council is calling on the public to tell them where the axe on public services should fall as the local authority has to save another £15.4 million by March next year, and a total of £30 million by the end of 2013/14.
The SIC has already made efficiency savings of £11.5 million during the last financial year – £2.1 million more than had been anticipated – and described by chief executive Alistair Buchan as an “unprecedented achievement” for the local authority in Shetland.
Further savings will now need to come “out of significant service reorganisation”, he said
“Most of the savings of £30 million over the next two years will have to come out of services; we will push efficiency services internally as hard as we can, but ultimately those changes have an impact sooner or later on people’s services and the economy of Shetland.”
Back in February, councillors approved service cuts worth between £3 and £4 million but also decided to review as many as 52 services ranging from education and social services to ferries and road maintenance.
These reviews are now getting under way and Mr Buchan said he would urge the Shetland public to engage in helping to reshape public services across the isles.
“We cannot achieve what we have got to achieve without the involvement of the community. Everyone in Shetland has an interest in what is happening here.
“We want to do the best for the community, but the best for community at the moment unfortunately means getting our budgets reduced to a sustainable footing.
“What we are trying to do is manage the change in services to minimise the detrimental impact on the public as much as we can. They will have good ideas and the may be able to help us with that,” the chief executive said.
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Any delay or slippage in identifying and implementing savings could cost the public purse dear as Shetland Islands Council’s reserves have fallen by almost 60 percent over the last 12 years to £193 million.
Last year alone the SIC drew £36 million from its reserves to balance the books or, in other words, operated at a loss of £100,000 a day.
Mr Buchan continued: “We need to hear from the silent majority of people of Shetland, I think that is the voice that we most need to hear. I hope everyone realises the scale of the problem we have got here and the fact that it will impact on the services they get.
“People need to speak up, and it is our job in the council and the councillors to make the tough decisions at the end of the day, but we need to take the community with us as much as we possibly can.”
The first infrastructure consultation drop-in session focussing on ferries, winter maintenance and street lighting will be held in the Symbister hall, in Whalsay, on 14 June.
The council intends to advertise details of further consultation meetings shortly.
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