Tory councillors chairing committee meetings at the council continue to claim their special allowances despite these meetings being suspended until September due to the Covid-19 virus.
The council is facing a major financial crisis due to the pandemic and, at an emergency meeting of the council to discuss budget cuts, the ruling Tory group voted against the proposal that these special payments should also be stopped.
Councillor Nick Eden-Green said “It is absolutely extraordinary that we should even consider carrying on paying people for a job they aren’t doing and at a time when the council is being forced to slash its budget by many millions of pounds and reduce staffing levels. What message does this send out to our residents?”
Posted by Michael Dixey
Michael has been a city councillor since 1987 and is the leader of the Lib Dem Group on the City Council. He was a major force in the campaign to stop the building of the disastrous multi-storey car park in Station Road West. He has been particularly critical of the council’s lack of financial management which has resulted in the quadrupling of the council’s borrowings to £172 million over the four years prior to the COVID-19 outbreak which will cause huge additional pressure on civic finances.
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