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Dorset County Council facing £40m cuts
7:00pm Wednesday 21st July 2010 By James Durkin

CUTS of up to £40 million to County Hall budgets will be discussed at a meeting of Dorset County Council today – 24 hours after cabinet chiefs slashed nearly £1.5 million to services for children, vulnerable adults and the environment.

Senior councillors agreed a range of reductions yesterday in a first step towards saving £6.9 million by April 2011.
County council leader Cllr Angus Campbell said: “This is a really good start in identifying some of the key areas where savings can be made.
“We will be making, at some later date, some really tough decisions.”

Cabinet members voted to trim £272,000 from the adult and community services budget by diverting funds from the adult social care workforce grant, and reducing funding for activities in the Safer and Stronger Communities programme.
Spending in the children’s services department will now be cut by £633,000, including a £235,000 reduction in spending on the Learning and School Improvement project.
Environment spending will be slashed by £591,000 after yesterday’s meeting.
Some £346,000 will be trimmed from the council’s contribution to the Dorset Safety Camera Partnership.
Further savings will be achieved by not implementing £102,000 of improvements earmarked for the Weymouth to Dorchester bus service, and cutting the Dorset Passenger Transport budget by £123,000.

Cabinet member for corporate resources Spencer Flower said: “The key thing is whatever we put on the list to make reductions will have an element of pain in it.”
“We are going to have to step up to the plate and take our part of the pain.”
The council’s chief financial officer, Paul Kent, told yesterday’s meeting that the full extent of government funding cuts would not be known until a spending review in October.
He warned that initial estimates of between £27 and £40 million “might be slightly underestimated”.