The Tories, facing an electoral black hole, have made attempts to deal with another – the £5 billion void in council budgets. More and more councils, after accepting over a decade of austerity, are cutting their services to the bare legal minimum. The Tories have announced an extra £600 million of funds.
You don’t have to be Albert Einstein to work out that won’t plug the funding gap.
But the Tories have another solution – making you pay for it! Michael Gove, ‘Levelling up secretary’, has instructed all councils to raise council tax by the maximum without a referendum – 4.99%! That’s an extra £2 billion of tax, mainly paid by working-class people, while the Tories are set to announce giveaways for the richest later in the year.
We need councillors and MPs that will stand up and fight for the resources council services desperately need. A united fight, like what happened in Liverpool in the 80s, could save our services and put the Tory government and cutting councils into the bin.
