Fears Birmingham’s 21% council tax rise could lead to mass exodus

Steep budget cuts announced by Birmingham City Council will drive residents away, lead to “disgusting” streets and make areas “less safe”, councillors in the city have warned.

A 21 per cent rise in council tax over the next two years was confirmed this week in a bid to recover from effective bankruptcy.

The Labour-controlled council also plans to spend £367m less on services and axe 600 jobs to save £100m.

A £1.25bn bailout has been requested from the Government but if granted, the money would still be a loan that must be paid back through the sale of assets.

The council has not specified which assets will be sold, but Conservative councillors warned they could include libraries, 25 of which could close.

The 9.99 per cent council tax increase this year will push the average household bill from £1,630 to £1,794.

The budget for adult social care will be cut by £77m over two years, which will include a review of care packages, day centres and services to support adults to leave hospital and regain their independence.

Spending on services supporting children and families will be reduced by £120m in the same period, which will include cuts to early help, assisted transport and support for children not in education, employment or training.

The council will dim street lights to save £900,000, reduce spending on highway maintenance and move to fortnightly rubbish collections to save £4m a year.

Cultural grants will be cut off and bereavement fees will be increased.

Matt Bennett, a Conservative councillor in Birmingham, said the cuts will have a “devastating impact” on residents.

“Some parts of the city are really messy and disgusting as it is right now, with the levels of expenditure they have,” he told i. “If you’re reducing the level of expenditure that much it’s going to spread that to all different parts of the city.

“Everywhere will probably become as bad as the worst parts of the city. They can barely keep up with the road repairs as they are – that’s going to get worse. The general ambience of the place as you go around will become a lot worse, parks will take a huge hit – they will become more overgrown and less nice, less safe.”

He warned that residents could become increasingly fed up of paying more taxes in exchange for fewer services.

“People won’t want to come and live in Birmingham, I suspect,” he said. “Or if they do live in Birmingham they’ll want to move elsewhere where they can have a better quality of life.”

Councillor Robert Alden, leader of the Conservative opposition, said increased bills will pile pressure on household incomes and many residents living in deprivation will likely see support they receive away.

“When you look at the states of the streets in across the city, many of the streets in the city have rubbish on them already,” he told i. “Now the council are proposing to cut more street cleaning services and to make refuse collections less frequent.

“All of that will increase the pressure on the already breaking refuse service, and likely lead to more rubbish being left on our streets.”

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He said the council has also failed to assess whether the dimming of street lights could “make life more dangerous”.

Mr Alden described it as “totally unacceptable” that the Labour Party in Birmingham have chosen to target frontline services rather than trying to make savings by cutting back office costs and sharing services with neighbouring councils.

In a report published alongside the budget proposals, Fiona Greenway, the council’s director of finance, said: “Financial mismanagement is deep-rooted within Birmingham City Council, with overreliance on the use of reserves, growing liabilities, imprudent estimates in relation to financial planning, a historical inability to deliver savings, and a number of open prior year accounts back to 2020.”

John Cotton, Labour leader of the council, said it had “no alternative” to the sweeping cuts and rising tax.

“Birmingham City Council is facing a number of financial challenges and I want to apologise unreservedly for both the significant spending reductions and this year’s substantial council tax increase,” he said.

“We have no alternative than to face these challenges head on. And we will do whatever is necessary to put the council back on a sound financial footing.

“Our situation has been made much worse by a national crisis in local government finance.

“A combination of austerity and underfunding, Birmingham has lost over £1bn in funding since 2011, added to a rising demand for services and inflation mean that, across the country local authorities are facing some of the biggest budget challenges in living memory.”