Have your say on next year’s council priorities and budgets

We have launched an online survey for people to put forward their views on our priorities and spending for the next financial year on local services such as refuse collection and recycling, street cleaning, anti-social behaviour, the local economy, homelessness, sports, leisure and events.

We spend around £11 million each year on local services. Around £7 million of this comes from council tax with the rest from business rates and other income.  

The survey is open until 30 November via our consultation pages alongside other opportunities for taking part in the consultation including polls, an online ideas board and the chance to post questions to us about our work. We are also looking to organise a series of question and answer sessions with a variety of groups across the district to discuss local priorities as part of the consultation.

Councillor Rob Strachan, Cabinet Member for Finance, Procurement, Customer Services and Revenues and Benefits, said:

“Our priorities and budget consultation is an important element of our planning process because it helps us better understand the issues that our residents, businesses, and voluntary sector groups want us to focus on.

“We would like to gather views from as many local people as possible about the issues that are important to them to help shape our spending priorities for the next financial year. 

“The past two years have been extremely challenging in many ways for many different parts of the local community so now, more than ever, it is vitally important that we focus our energies and resources where they can have the most impact.”

Feedback gathered through the priorities and budget consultation will be used to inform discussions on spending priorities over the next year and beyond. The final budget decision for the 2022 to 2023 financial year will be made at a meeting of the full council in February.