Friday January 18th 2019
Midlothian Unison writes
Midlothian Council need over £10 million to plug a gap in it’s finances and Unison Midlothian is committed to encouraging our Midlothian Elected Members to obtain additional funding from the Scottish Government.
The frightening reality is that if this additional money is not obtained that there will be major cuts to services across the authority and this means hundreds of jobs will be lost. All non-statutory services are being proposed as cuts and redundancy packages for staff at its’ minimum level.
This could mean that only one library and leisure centre remain open which would seriously impact on the education and health of our residents. There may be a reduction in the support we give to our homeless, piling even more misery on the most vulnerable in our society.
Consideration is being given to reducing the frequency of recycling and waste collections which will frustrate residents and increase the likelihood of fly tipping. The state of our roads will only deteriorate as maintenance budgets will be reduced which will include less gritting with a reduction in the winter budget.
Expect to see the grass cut less often in your town and more litter in the streets making our streets look untidy and uncared for, all of this this is not acceptable and the list could go on.
Unison Midlothian don’t just care about the council employees, we care about the residents of Midlothian and how they will be effected. We are raising our families here too and living in the community we recognise that all our services are vital for the needs of the community.
The way we see it is over the next few weeks Midlothian Council are playing Jenga with services and jobs. Our services support each other with statutory depending on non-statutory services to function.
We need our councillors to press for additional money from the Scottish Government now. The budget formula used is antiquated and two years behind but that is a long term fight. This is the fastest growing authority in Scotland we are being penalised year on year as we have more residents but inadequate funding to operate to the level our population deserve.
We need as many people as possible to join this campaign before the chance is gone, budgets are set and decisions made. We will be continuing our campaign outside the Unison Midlothian Office, 1 Eskdail Court, Dalkeith at 12:30pm on Tuesday 22 January and walking over to Midlothian House.
ALL are welcome to join as ALL will be affected.
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