- Don Foster MP
- Graham Watson MEP
- Who's My Councillor?
BathNES Liberal Democrats
Serving Bath and North East Somerset
Working For You - All Year Round
Cllr Paul Crossley's budget speech
by Ben Stevens
Check against deliveryI’d like to start by thanking David Bellotti, Tim Richens, Andrew Pate and all the other officers who have worked so hard over the past 6 months on this budget.
Let’s not lose sight of the fact that this has not been an easy task.
Whatever you think of the coalition’s deficit reduction strategy, we are at the coalface in Local Government and our officers have done a fantastic job.
Cllr David Bellotti's Budget Speech
by Ben Stevens
check against delivery
‘The three principles of the Liberal Democrat budget this year are first, protecting essential frontline services, second, no increases in council tax and third, investing in homes and jobs for local people.
‘We will receive less money from Central Government this coming year because the Coalition Government is still repaying the debts left by the last Labour Government. We are faced with removing around £30M from our spending over three years.
For years our river has been neglected. The Lib Dem group want this to change.
We're putting £100,00 into the budget for specific river projects and we're investing in flood compensation to ensure that our river economy can flourish alongside the natural environment.
The Lib Dems understand how important our small businesses are, and how many jobs they help create.
We're investing in a pot of money, with our partners in the Charity Sector, to provide over 70 loans to small businesses and creating over 80 jobs.
We want to enable as many people as possible to travel in an environmentally friendly way.
With this in mind, we're investing half a million into cycle routes across the district. As well as being good for the environment, it'll take people off the road, improving congestion.
Many people rely on the bus services to get around.
The Lib Dems are not cutting bus subsidies which has saved the 6/7 bus service as well as other rural services that connect our rural areas.
Other council's might bet thinking about cutting the number of refuse and recyling collections. We're not.
We're keeping weekly collection of your rubbish, saving the services that matter to you.
Our local shops are struggling in these economic times.
The Lib Dems are investing in the local economy and keeping the car parks that serve our local highstreets free.