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Originally Posted by park381
Are Cllr's issued with "free laptops"  if so why
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There are 8 laptops, 4 each [Lab-Con]. I object. They are not a priority. Some older desktops would have done given the financial crises. The govt [our govt] is pushing all councillors to be e-enabled!! The recent report was that this should be rolled out to all 35 [in line with gov 'target'!] but savings would have to found. I don't have one.
So many important tings have gone unreported yet when ever PB speaks it gets printed. About 4 months ago the council realised it ws spending money twice and had run up a double spend of £484,000. They had to borrow that money to pay off the short term debt. When PB blamed Labour for bills in the bottom drawer [an excuse bordering on a lie] in 2003 with the £1.8m overspend he said words like 'under us.. under control.. public could trust.. getting hold of situation...financial responsibilty...strategies..safeguards... etc' and it was all reported. However 12 months on a half a million is mispent [AGAIN!] and how column inches did it make. At that meeting PB got another populist topic put on the agenda and so it goes on.
The wardens. The press keep reporting a shortfall in govt funding. No its not. Thats a lie. PB says the govt has short changed the councl. Year on year grants above inflation have left the council cash rich. Since 1999 the goverment increases are +36%. Inflation is about 20%. And in 2003 Housing Benefit payments were altered and that benefited us by 500,000, [of £8m - so about another 6% on top of 36%].
Rate rise have been above inflation as well. This year 5% [Tory], last year 3.9 [Tory], the year before [Lab] 3.9 including 1% national insurance that year!, the year before 7.9% [Tory] the year before that 0% [Tory] the year before that 4%? [Tory]
What was reported a lot by the press was this years govt grant. Shortchanged ran the headline. The govt had reset the funding formula and under the new one [compared to what we would have got with the old one] we lost £400,000. PB said - printed by the press - the govt had sold Hyndburn down the river. Well the governments grant AFTER this recalculation was still an overall increase of some 6.2%. It would have been 12% with it. So hows HBC getting a bad deal PB? And why are the papers not reporting the events accurately?