In the weeks leading up to the meeting we collected signatures to a petition opposing the cuts to public services. In it we called on the authority to use its powers to avoid making cuts and to insist that central government make up the shortfall. This gave us speaking rights to raise our petition at the meeting. The text of the speech Graham Higginson gave is as follows:
Thank you
for giving me the opportunity to speak in support of this petition, which asks
you not to carry out any further cuts in Jobs or Services, and instead to set a
Budget to meet the needs of the people of Cumbria, in opposition to the orders
of central government.
The petition
was organised at short notice by Carlisle Socialist Party, and the signatures
were mostly obtained on two Saturday mornings in January in the streets of
Carlisle, Penrith and Workington, in little more than an hour. There are 116 signatures, 41 from Carlisle
residents, 48 from Penrith and Eden, and 27 from various parts of West Cumbria.
This
petition asks you to stop the process of cutting services generally, year after
year, in ways which are increasingly damaging to the community which you are
supposed to represent – which you have a duty
to represent and to champion.
This was not
a local campaign on a single issue, conducted over weeks, with the support of a
local newspaper, Chamber of Trade, and a Member of Parliament, so naturally it
does not have a great many signatures. The
present Leader of the Council will no doubt dismiss it, as “not statistically
significant”. But although it has only a
small number of signatures, that does not mean there is no widespread support
for the demand. What is significant is
that very few people who had the chance to sign the petition refused to do so,
and those who refused did so because they did not think it would make any
difference – “What’s the point, they never listen”.
The County
Council’s budget consultation gave the public the choice between cuts of £24.4
million or £22.6 million in 2014/15, which we have compared to having your arm
cut off above or below the elbow.
Subsequently the lower level cuts option has been withdrawn, and the amount
of future cuts has been substantially increased. So what was the point of the so-called
consultation?
We say the
people of Cumbria should have been given the chance to vote against any more
cuts – to maintain current levels of service.
This would require Cumbria County Council to set a budget to meet the
needs of the people of Cumbria, and to lead a fight against cuts which damage
the county’s economy and society. It
would mean that Members of the County Council, of all parties, should campaign
within their own parties, and put pressure on the county’s M.P.s (most of whom
belong to the coalition government parties) to demand that the government halt
any further cuts to council budgets.
Local
government expenditure did not cause the financial crisis, yet, as the present
Deputy Leader of the Council has recently said, local government is being made
to bear a disproportionate amount of the reduction in public expenditure.
Socialists
believe the financial crisis had a completely different cause, and that the
wrong people are being made to pay for it, while those who caused it get off
scot free, and are even massively rewarded with bonuses, which the government
appears either unwilling or unable to control.
We believe there are sufficient national resources to “balance the
nation’s books” in a totally different way.
We do not
claim that all of the people who signed this petition would agree with all of
our policies, but they do agree that “Enough is Enough – No More Cuts in Jobs or
Services”. We believe there is growing
evidence (such as the Cumberland News survey of county opinion) that large
numbers of people agree that the cuts have gone too far and are severely
damaging to the county.
You cannot
pretend that these cuts do not impact on front-line services, and are
detrimental to the public who use and rely on the services. You cannot pretend that the cuts are not a
severe blow to the staff who lose their jobs, and even those who remain in work
suffer from heavier workloads to cover for absent colleagues. You cannot pretend that the loss of
purchasing power has no ill effects on the local economy. You cannot pretend that the cuts are not
increasing disappointment, depression and despair in the whole community.
You say you
are sorry, but you have no choice. The
government orders you to cut, and so you must obey. If you, our elected councillors, cannot carry
out the policies which the county needs, what use are you? If you cannot do what you say you would like
to do, why should anyone vote for you?
Growing numbers do not vote at all, and is it any wonder, when whatever
the outcome of the election, you form coalitions which do the bidding of
central government and cut services and jobs year after year?
A final
question - Who do you think you are? Are
you the representatives of the people of Cumbria? If so, fight for them, protect their
interests. Or are you the servants of
Westminster and Whitehall? If that is
the case, we might as well be ruled directly by government commissioners, and
cut out the expense of the County Council and the sham of local government
altogether.
We say you
should stop following the orders of a government which nobody elected, on an
austerity programme which the majority voted against, and which one of the
parties now in government said it was opposed to at the general election. If county and district councils do not fight
for the right to make their own decisions and to provide the services which
their communities need, then local government ceases to have any meaning. In asking you to Stop the Cuts in Jobs and
Services, we ask you to stand up for Cumbria; stand up for local government and
Democracy, against central government and Dictatorship.
