I've just been looking again at that fantastic Edinburgh budget. I admire those councillors who brought home the prize of a balanced budget which begins to repair the damage that Labour did, puts money back into the reserves (imagine a city the size of Edinburgh having reserves of only £37k - dangerous as well as bizarre), and continues to fund front-line services well.
Education, for example, where the council administration factored in an extra rise of £0.8million to Edinburgh schools to take account of rising fuel prices.
Add the £19m over three years for improving school buildings and the £33m over six years for the Wave 3 schools, no closures of Community Education centres, £100,000 for activities for school pupils during the holidays, and saving £2m a year in central bureaucracy to plough back into our schools.
Well done those councillors.
There's a person who keeps leaving anonymous comments about the budget - I'll do you a deal, I'll accept your anonymous posting, I appreciate that some people don't have the courage to stand up and be recognised. If you want your comments published on my blog, though, provide the evidence for them (show your working in other words). I'll give you an example of how to do this:
In the Policy and Strategy report to the budget, Appendix 2 shows how this budget amends the budget left by Labour (each budget covers three years). You will see that the first line in each year is for Children and Families. Labour's budget (passed last year) intended just under £311.9 million for C&F, the amended budget passed by the SNP with Lib Dem help (that should annoy someone) gives that budget line £346.4 million - the actual rise (using the extended figures from the budget) is £34.567 million.
That's the current administration putting 11% more into Children and Families than Labour wanted.
Easy really - all the papers are online.
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