Council leader pledges to listen to the public ahead of budget cuts consultation

2:52pm Wednesday 6th March 2013 in News Photograph of the Author By Vicki Henderson, Darlington reporter

A COUNCIL leader has said the authority would be mad not to listen to public opinion ahead of tough budget cuts as he acknowledged a level of cynicism among Darlington residents about taking part in consultation.

Councillor Bill Dixon pledged to explain all future budget decisions "in a clear and transparent way" to any Darlington resident who feels an incorrect decision has been made by councillors.

Darlington Borough Council is preparing for one of the biggest consultation exercises in the authority’s history as it looks to cut £17m from its budget in the next four years.

The council has warned that "nothing is sacred" and urged people to attend the meetings of four budget advisory panels later this year to give their ideas and views on what services should be cut and what should be saved.

Speaking at a meeting of the council’s cabinet, Coun Dixon said: “I can understand a degree of cynicism from the public about the consultation. But if you think the cuts have been bad so far then you’ve seen nothing yet.

“The council and the cabinet would be mad not to take into account the views of the public. There would be no point in doing the consultation and just ignoring what the public has said.

“Where we can’t do what the public say they want to see, we will give them a clear and transparent reason why not. I will give a very clear take on why something is not possible.

“I can’t sit here and say that everything the public asks for will be granted but, if there is anything they reasonably ask for and we can’t afford to do it, we should be able to give a reasonable answer about why we can’t.”

Councillor Heather Scott, leader of the opposition Conservative group, said: “We support what is being done but we have to be honest and up front with people if they are asking for things to happen. We need to know the structure of these panels and how they will make recommendations.

“We’ve got to encourage as many members of the public to be involved as possible.”

Comments(8)

Homshaw1 says...
3:42pm Wed 6 Mar 13

It would be handy to list items and ask the public to rank in order of priority

Eg

Cleaning the streets
New Wheelie Bins
Wage uncreases for Managers
Keep stressholme
Cut Housing benefits
etc

Maybe we could have a brainstorming exercise to compile a list. When it is complete it could be published it in the Echo. People could then send it off to the Echo who could compile the results

It would be good to have a budget based on what people want

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Madadrian says...
3:59pm Wed 6 Mar 13

Consultation??????
We were never consulted about wheelie bins. We were never consulted about closing all the public conveniences in the town. I bet they haven't looked at the biggest wastes of money in the leisure industry. The subsidised golf. The subsidised theatre. The subsidised leisure centre. All paid for by some of the lowest income earners in the town who cannot afford to use these places .

This stinking bunch of stalinists are only interested in getting their snouts in the council tax trough. Which is another item that should be scrapped. Their allowances, How on earth can some of them justify taking anything from 17000 to 30000 a year? Pure greed

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Homshaw1 says...
5:47pm Wed 6 Mar 13

Madadrian wrote:
Consultation??????
We were never consulted about wheelie bins. We were never consulted about closing all the public conveniences in the town. I bet they haven't looked at the biggest wastes of money in the leisure industry. The subsidised golf. The subsidised theatre. The subsidised leisure centre. All paid for by some of the lowest income earners in the town who cannot afford to use these places .

This stinking bunch of stalinists are only interested in getting their snouts in the council tax trough. Which is another item that should be scrapped. Their allowances, How on earth can some of them justify taking anything from 17000 to 30000 a year? Pure greed
Presumably we could put cutting the number of councillors on the list. We don;t need two for one small area

Consultation is good but not if there is no outcome. We had a survey from Real Results Marketing a short while ago which must has cost money. Another survey was delivered in the last rwo weeks. We have 2 councillors who should know what people want. Its all a waste of time and money if nothing happens.

Meanwhile the streets don't get cleaned and anti social behaviour is rife

Its all perverse waste and extravagance. We need something like the Put Hartlepool First Party for Darlington. It's all getting very silly

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Savant_NE says...
6:49pm Wed 6 Mar 13

Shortcut all the building project redtape.
More buildings ,more income.
The Council can do a lot to speed these up,Feethams,Central,
Faverdale,WestPark .Lingfield point.All should be well underway by now.
We are told Social Housing is a critical shortage...instant win, build Council Housing.
There are even funds to be had to building projects bringing old buildings up to date.With Bennet House,Mowden Hall, Old BT exchange and parts of Lingfield point all can use these funds,to modernise, reuse and generate income.
As well as looking for ways to cut things ,put an equal amount of time into how income can be generated.

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Spy Boy says...
12:21am Thu 7 Mar 13

A listening council ? That would be a great idea. Where can we get one of those ?

I've attended council meetings and experienced first hand what they believe is consultation. It's certainly not the definition in any dictionary. Sitting looking bored for half an hour is not consultation. I'm glad Mr Dixon understands the cynicism. Now look up 'Consultation.' There are a few more words and phrases he may like to look up too. Inept, Arrogant, Self Absorbed, Self Serving, Thoughtless, Un-imaginitive, Inept ( Worth a second mention. ) It would be onerous to type them all.

I would agree with Mr Dixon about one thing though; You ain't seen nothing yet. I've been saying this for ages. One thing never changes though; The same mindless bunch will still be at the helm to steer us even further into the mire. Still on their huge salaries and out of their depth on every project outside of filling in their expenses.

Why don't we have people in these jobs that can turn all this around ? People who are there for the town and it's residents rather than their own little agandas. It seems a closed shop to me.

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Darloresident says...
9:05am Thu 7 Mar 13

I am tired of Bill Dixons and his inept,inefficient,in
competent bunch of cabinet collegues banging on about consultation..They are not the slightest bit interested in what the tax paying residents want.They have their own agenda which mostly consists of unwanted expensiveschemes (everone has their favourites from cycle paths that go nowhere to the gutless decision to rip the heart out of our unique town centre and replace it with an already crumbling soulless "pedestrian" precinct).
Millions can be found for an unwanted Wheelie Bin project while in the same breath Mr Dixon talks about consultation on the future.Why not consult us on the originally cabinet proposed 3.5% council tax increase?A vote would have been nice..Instead you put up the tax as much as you are allowed (2%) without having to have a referendum.You really are spineless when it really comes to letting Darlington residents have a say in our future.This council and its cabinet have been around far too long and its time the fresh winds of change blew through this town and gave us what we deserve-astute people with clarity,competence and vision who understand "Public" service.Have your consultations Mr Dixon..You probably hope no one turns up so you can say the residents are not interested.You will I feel get your way as everyone (and I mean everyone) who I speak to who are Council tax payers think that consultation is a waste of time and you will do what you want anyway..
Cynical?? by god we are..

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Oh Happy Days says...
1:19pm Thu 7 Mar 13

All the above comments refect the majority of views in the town. I for one am in total unison with them, The council makes all the right noises about listening and then just goes ahead with it's own original plan.
Why are these people in these highly paid positions - because we voted for them to represent OUR views and OUR wishes.
Weve gone from one inept leader in Williams to one inept leader in Dixon
I say get them out and install Gill Cartwright. . . She consults, she listens, she plans and then she acts

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Spy Boy says...
5:18pm Thu 7 Mar 13

It's good to see some other residents think along the same lines as myself. Bill Dixon said in a meeting last year that this was not the best job he'd had and more or less added that someone has to do it. If it's too much, Bill, as it obviously is for so many of you, get out and let someone with the right skills and abilities do it instead. It's the one thing that you and your council cronies can do to make us all happy. Get lost now.

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