'Challenging times ahead' for Torbay Council as budget is proposed

“There are challenging times ahead” is the message Torbay Council’s Director of Finance Malcolm Coe gave as he outlined the council’s revenue and capital budget proposals for 2024/25.

The council says it needs to find around £300,000 in extra income or cost savings to create a balanced budget.

Currently, Torbay Council's total revenue budget is £139 million, with a revenue support grant from the government coming in at just £8.2 million and the rest having to be raised locally through council tax and business rates.

The government’s revenue support contribution has fallen in the last decade from around half of the total budget to its current level of under six per cent.

However, Mr Coe added: “We’ve got solid financial foundations here. We're not on a cliff edge, like many of our colleagues up and down the country.

“We try to set our budget looking into the medium to long term like any good business would.”

While an alarming number of councils across the country are filing a Section 114 ‘bankruptcy’ notice, councillors emphasised that Torbay Council would not be among them.

“That is not in our vocabulary,” said council leader David Thomas (Conservative, Preston).

He added: “Thankfully, we are pleased to be in a different situation, and this is because of the difficult decisions and financial savings that the council has had to make over the past decade.”

Council tax bills are likely to rise by 4.75 per cent, a fraction below the government cap of 4.99 per cent.

This is made up of two per cent for adult social care and the remainder for the rest of the council’s services.

Another way the council plans to balance the books is by looking into the sale of some of its controversial out-of-town assets. Valued at around £175 million, they include a pasty factory in Cornwall, a cinema in Somerset and an Amazon warehouse in Exeter.

The council has been criticised for buying properties outside the bay, but a recent meeting heard that the portfolio continues to earn it millions of pounds in rent every year.

However, council deputy leader Chris Lewis (Con, Preston) said Torbay’s most valued assets, such as Oldway Mansion and Torquay's Pavillion would form part of any sell-off.

“The assets that mean a lot to the people of Torbay are not on that list,” he said. “We have found £1 million for urgent repairs to Oldway and we recently reached an agreement with the leaseholders on the Pavilion.

“We are determined to deliver on those two assets.”

The council added that other savings will be focussed on ‘big ticket’ items that will be delivered over a number of years.
 
In terms of spending, the council plans to invest £1.9 million into children’s services to meet demand and rising costs and will increase the amount it pays to the Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust by £1.1 million to support vulnerable adults. It will sink £900,000 into temporary accommodation and strategies to combat homelessness.

A new ‘Operation Brighter Bay’ will see £300,000 a year invested in grass cutting, weeding, road marking, cleaning and pothole repairs. And ‘Operation Town Centres’ will bring £300,000 per year to tackle anti-social behaviour.

There will be £1 million spread over four years to support events in Torbay and the council will work with its recently appointed commercial partners on £25 million of capital works, including flood defences, schools and housing.

Fees and charges for things like parking and licensing will go up by around four per cent to help pay for the investment. Money raised from increased parking charges will be invested back into car parks.

Cllr Thomas went on: “Our strong foundations of stable financial management will create the building blocks for us to move forward with better certainty and a clear understanding of our financial position.”

The full budget proposals can be seen on the Torbay Council website, which also has details of a public consultation which runs until Wednesday 7 February.