Chris Howells, Chair of Bicester Branch, Banbury and Bicester CLP
Chris Howells, Chair of Bicester Branch, Banbury and Bicester CLP

Given the ongoing saga of ‘Partygate’ currently engulfing the media and Parliament to the exclusion of almost everything else that matters to people outside of Westminster, its almost impossible to get any recognition that local public services are yet again under increasing threat.

‘Paying for the Pandemic’ is a useful cover for continuing the last 10 years of austerity and seems certain to intensify. So, as we enter the local authority budget setting season, both Oxfordshire County Council and Cherwell District Council budgets will be cut further with savings of £13m and £2.6m respectively. Yet Council Tax will increase for the County by 5% and Cherwell a flat £5 per Band D household.

As we pointed out last month, rail fares are rising in April due to a national failure in public transport policy with all the impact this will have on local household budgets. And local  parking charges will rise again during 2022 by up to 10p per hour, and year on year for the next 5 years. If that were not enough, we will now be charged for going ‘green’, with garden waste bin collection costing £36 to £40 a year and £30 per extra bin used starting next month because its ‘not a statutory responsibility’. What other non-statutory responsibility services will we be paying for in future on top of the Council Tax we all have to pay?

In Bicester, the bowling alley is to close permanently and the sports and leisure budget will be cut by £500,000 at a time when the young and growing population of the Town desperately needs adequate provision. Where is ‘levelling up’ locally in that?

One slight ray of sunshine is that Cherwell’s plan to discontinue support for the shared public space CCTV system, which has cameras in Banbury, Bicester and Kidlington has been scrapped following pressure from Labour and the public, and a review by Thames Valley Police. In view of the growing concern for the safety of women and girls in our town centres, that is welcome news.

The sacrifices people have made during the pandemic both locally and nationally are well known and we are told that the cost of tackling the pandemic has to be paid for! We already knew that more than £5.5Bn of taxpayer money from the government’s coronavirus assistance schemes including furlough, self-employed support and “eat out to help out” was paid out to fraudsters or given out incorrectly.

And now, buried underneath the ongoing row about Downing Street parties during lockdown and tucked away on p199 of the Department of Health and Social Care’s annual report published on Monday was the stunning revelation that it incurred £8.7Bn worth of losses on the £12.1Bn of PPE the Department purchased in 2020/21. That’s almost £9Bn or 75% wasted on inadequate and largely useless PPE.

From what has been publicly admitted then, more than £14Bn of taxpayers money has been wasted. Have we clawed back anything spent on useless equipment supposed to protect us, and that fraudulently claimed support during the pandemic. Or has it all disappeared into private hands never to be returned. As if by coincidence, it just happens that we have to pay an additional £12Bn next year in National Insurance to cover the shortfall in Social Care funding! It’s hard not to conclude that the political system, never very healthy at best, is now in a process of self-destruction, along with many of the public services we rely on.

First published as a Bicester Advertiser column by Chris Howells, Chair of Bicester Branch, Banbury and Bicester Constituency Labour Party

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