Budget setting
Today is the Full Council meeting of the County Council, which will set a budget for the next financial year. The administration at County Hall, of which I am the Cabinet member with responsibility for finance, does not have an overall majority after the departure of Labour from the Oxfordshire Fair Deal Alliance. I am expecting a long meeting in Oxford.
You may have seen in the papers for the meeting that we are proposing above inflation increases in spending on Adult Social Care and Children’s Services, and additional money going into flood defences. We are offsetting this with a set of savings in areas, such as reducing the layers of management and trying to ensure our children can be looked after in Oxfordshire rather than elsewhere. The County Council remains financially robust, but there are limits to what can be done with the funding available.
It has been a complex path to get to this point, involving some really useful consultation exercises as well as grappling with the Government producing its “final” settlement in two parts so that we only discovered our final expected income earlier this month.
Flooding
As mentioned last month, the recent flooding should be a wake-up call about building in places that can’t be kept dry. The flooding of the Fishponds and playing fields from the Chilbrook, which is only a small stream, was impressive. There will be more money in the budget for flood defences and a cross-agency process to improve on our flood preparedness and responses.
A40 update
No further progress to report on the A40; discussions with Homes England continue. The public enquiry on the other HIF scheme, based in Didcot, commenced today.
You may have seen that the A40 cycle route is being scraped to restore it to its original width after decades of neglect. It makes a huge difference. The section near Cassington and the Barnard Gate-to-Witney section have now been completed.
As ever, please contact me with queries, comments or requests via my email dan.levy@oxfordshire.gov.uk.