£137 Per Household: The Ongoing Cost of the Former County Council's Debt Legacy

During the budget-setting process some information emerged about the full, eye-watering extent of the debt left by the former Conservative County Council when it was abolished in March 2009. It passed on to Bedford Borough Council, or more accurately to local taxpayers, a £90 million millstone which every single local taxpayer is paying for. The figure that emerged was that the cost of this legacy of debt is an average of £137 per household! That's £137 every year from every average Band D Council Tax bill in the Borough. Without it, we could have a free month!

Unitary Councils such as Bedford Borough Council are always going to carry some debt, as they need to make investments in areas such as crucial roads infrastructure, schools and many more, and this will inevitably involve some borrowing. However, the £90 million left by the former County Council is extremely tough for local taxpayers, and it sadly doesn't even tell the whole story. The burden left by the former Tory County Council on local taxpayers also includes a vast overspend on the first phase of the Western Bypass of at least £4 million, while the cost of capping the Elstow Landfill site was underestimated by several million pounds. These liabilities have been left for the Borough Council taxpayer to pick up.

What makes the debt left by the County Council even worse is the fact that this debt built up at a time of spiralling Council tax bills, with Borough taxpayers charged the second highest County Council tax level in the country. Despite overspending like this, the Councty Council also allowed services to deteriorate with, for example, roads and pavements left crumbling and care services for the vulnerable at crisis point.

While investing in the Borough and its future, for example through our £41 million investment plan for our schools, we have acted on this issue. We have brought spending under control, bringing the annual programme of capital spending down from around £20 million to £15 million. We have also paid off around £1 million of the debt, while the new items of capital expenditure include 'invest to save' items which actually save more money than they will cost over the next year. We are protecting services and keeping tax down by cutting out waste and targetting savings away from the front line, and do not believe in building up debt mountains that will have to be paid back over many, many years.