Glasgow’s trade unions demand council sets a No Cuts budget

Council trade unions in Glasgow representing 20,000 workers are demanding the Labour authority sets a “No Cuts Budget” for 2015.

On the initiative of Glasgow City Unison, with the support of Unite, EIS and the GMB, unions have written to all councillors explaining the political choices before them.

Either councillors implement the Con Dem cuts by responding to the council’s Director of Finance’s request for proposals to remove £29 million from the 2015/16 budget, or they use all available financial mechanisms to hold-off any further cuts for this year, whilst leading a mass campaign to win more money for the city.

The trade unions letter made it absolutely clear they will fully support any council politician or political group who now says “No More Cuts”.

Already £200 million has been cut from council spending in Glasgow over the last five years, including the loss of over 4,000 jobs.     

The trade unions outlined concrete financial proposals of how the council’s reserves and borrowing powers could be used to meet the £29 million “gap” for 2015/16.

This would allow the time and space to build a mass campaign of elected members, trade unions, user groups and local communities with the objective of winning more money from national government.

The £29 million gap could be met with the following measures:

• Do not put £3 million back into the council’s general reserve as proposed by the Director of Finance
• Use a further £6 million from the General Reserve (leaving £12 million).
• Add £20 million to the existing £1.6 Billion debt of the council.

The current annual servicing cost to the council of the £1.6 billion debt is £180 million. The trade union’s proposal would add around £200,000 to that annual payment.

The letter notes that the Council Administration has stated that £13 million of the £29 million gap is due to Glasgow being treated unfairly under the national needs based indicators.

City Treasurer, Councillor Paul Rooney, responded to the trade unions “no cuts budget” letter stating “The £29 million of savings you refer to are savings from our revenue budget, and we are not permitted, except in very narrow circumstances, to use borrowing to fund revenue costs. Essentially, we are not legally allowed to implement your suggestion.

“While a spending reduction of £29 million feels like a large number, it is sadly relatively small compared with the funding cuts we are likely to see in the following two or three years. All Scottish councils will make some difficult decisions next year, however they are in no way as difficult as the decisions they will be forced to take in the future”.

Rooney’s response further reveals the council’s intention to carry out the work of the Con Dem’s in decimating services on a larger and larger scale annually.

It also shows the lack of political will by council leaders to protect the workforce and communities. Surely in this period of increasing and relentless austerity being rained down on local government the “narrow circumstances” needed to use borrowing powers could be created, backed up by a mass campaign against threats of illegality?

It’s also clear from Rooney’s response that more borrowing streams could be opened up with recapitalisation (or reallocation) of council revenue spending and reserves.

Rooney concludes his letter by appealing to the trade unions to join council leaders in asking for more funding from Holyrood. The union’s also call for this and would support the SNP led Scottish Government using its powers to set a no cuts budget.

But it is not enough for Glasgow council’s administration to blame Holyrood or Westminster for the cuts and refuse to put up any fight.

If a no cuts budget was set in Glasgow, Scotland’s largest local authority, backed by a mass campaign, this could be start of a campaign linking up defiant councils across the country to put pressure on Holyrood and Westminster to give back the billions stolen in austerity cuts.    

It’s likely the union’s will be only force politically challenging the council’s cuts agenda with the other political groups, the SNP and the Greens, coming up with different ways to remove the £29 million from jobs and services.         

Pressure is building on politicians who refuse to stand up and fight the cuts.

Already there have been large angry protests over threats to remove mental health services partially funded by the council. Today Glasgow Labour Council scandalously voted through cuts to the Glasgow Association of Mental Health funding. Trade unions should come together across all 32 of  Scotland’s local authorities and join the Glasgow trade union’s public call for no cuts budgets.

Alongside this initiative politicians carrying out cuts must be challenged electorally. The Trade Union and Socialist Coalition is standing candidates in the forthcoming Westminster election to demand that councils and the Scottish Government set no cuts budgets. Trade Unionists should get involved with TUSC to build a fighting anti-cuts alternative to the pro-cuts politicians.