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Proposal considered for fewer councillors
Reduction from 52 to 40 Residents honour armed forces members would lead to savings of £84,000 a year By Adam Flinn
VË0 jËÄjÁÜ WjË?ÍËÍ jËÝ?ÁË j Á ? Ë Ë0 ?ÍW ? Ë®+ WÍÖÁjËMßË0 ?ÍW ? Ë+ Í ~Á?¬ WË ÖM¯ RESIDENTS lined the streets in Newbury and Thatcham on Sunday to pay their respects to the district’s armed forces. Remembrance parades were held
in both towns to commemorate 98 years since the end of the First World War. Following each parade, wreaths were laid by the towns’ mayors at the
respective war memorials, ahead of services held at Newbury’s St Nicolas Church and Thatcham’s St Mary’s Church. See page 5 for full story
NEW proposals being considered by West Berkshire Council could reduce the number of councillors by almost a quarter. An extraordinary meeting is being held on Tuesday next week to decide whether to cut the number of elected representatives from 52 to 40, plus or minus one. If approved it would save the council around £84,000 a year, and would take effect from the next district elections in 2019. It comes as the council last month launched a public consultation on further cuts to frontline services as it seeks to save £8million from next year’s budget. Council leader Roger Croft said: “We made a manifesto commitment back in 2015 to review the number of councillors, which we’ve done and believe 40 is the number we can work with. “Given the fi nancial situation of the council and people’s expectation that
government should be as small as possible realistically, we are putting this proposal forward.” However concerns have been brought up about how having fewer councillors might impact on how residents are represented, and that money could be better saved by cutting down the number of members on the council’s ruling executive board. At present, each councillor is responsible for an average of 2,208 electors, although with 40 members this would increase to an average of 2,870. While around £84,000 would be saved by having fewer councillors, it comes after members awarded themselves a 16.5 per cent pay rise on their basic allowances after last year’s local elections, going from £6,285 to £7,324. For 52 councillors, this amounted to a total increase of £54,028. Aside from the leader, there are also nine members on the executive who receive a special responsibility allowVË Í ÖjÄË Ë¬?~jËÏ