Hundreds of responses received to budget engagement

Hundreds of people have responded to the Highland Council’s programme of engagement, completing a survey or taking part in the budget simulator challenge.

The Council is facing an estimated budget gap of around £62m in 2024-25 and is expected to need over £100m over the next 3 years to balance the books with current expenditure.

The public, partners and staff were invited to take part in a survey and a budget simulator to try and balance the budget and prioritise spending. Nearly 1900 people have responded to the survey and some 429 people took part in the simulator challenge, while thousands of people watched our videos explaining the budget challenges for the Council.

Emerging themes are telling us that people understand the need to raise income generation through council tax and increases in fees and charges. Unsurprisingly, people value the less visible support services less, with winter gritting and kerbside refuse collection being valued more.

Suggestions to save money include increasing digitisation, charging motor homes for services, introducing the visitor levy and increasing use of renewable energy on our buildings.

Leader of the Council, Raymond Bremner said: “I am delighted that so many people have taken part in our survey and simulator challenge.  With less money, we need to decide whether to reduce our costs, to increase our income or a mixture of both. We want to focus our resources on key priorities and so it is important to know what matters most to our communities. There is still time to take part in both the survey and budget simulator for the next two weeks and I would encourage as many as possible to do that.”

Convener Bill Lobban said: “Highland Council is facing the same financial challenge as other public sector agencies and individual households are facing with increasing costs and inflation. We are looking at a range of options, however high interest rates and the increasing cost of borrowing limits these options at the current time. As everyone knows, especially in this festive season, it can be tempting to borrow money to get through the short term, but that simply stores up problems for the future and that is equally applicable to the Council as well as individuals.”

Cllr Bremner added: “Significant work is currently underway to find savings and income generation to close the budget gap. This is not an easy task and difficult decisions will be required, however we aim to balance the Council’s budget.”

There is still time to take part in the budget survey and simulator until 24 December.

Find out more at https://www.highland.gov.uk/budget.