Doncaster Council plans to cut dozens of jobs and raise council tax in bid to balance the books

Cabinet members will meet next Tuesday (October 1) to rubber-stamp plans which includes chopping 80 council staff and 15 Doncaster Children’s Services Trust employee positions over the next three financial years.

Bosses will initially look to delete vacant posts, then seek voluntary redundancies, redeployment and compulsory redundancy being the ‘last resort’.

Council tax is also set to go up by 1.99 per cent which is expected to bring in £2.2 million.

This will increase the council tax by 52 pence per week for Band D and 34 pence per week for Band A properties.

But financial forecasts suggests budget black hole at around £7.5million for 2020/21 and £16.8 million over the next three years.

The local government settlement in December is also expected to influence the budget which is being considered by a meeting of the full council on March 5, 2020.

Council reserves currently stand at around £14.8 million.

Mayor Ros Jones has hit out at the Government placing ‘increasing pressure on council services with no plan for the future’.

“The recent spending round provided some welcomed resources for key areas but did not deal with the long-term issues of funding for local government or address the previous cuts, it postponed those decisions for a further year which adds to the uncertainty locally,” she said.

“We will continue to care for and protect the most vulnerable, but it is inevitable that with less money from central government, residents will see services delivered in new and different ways.“As always we will protect jobs and frontline services where we can and we will look to work with our communities and partners more than ever to build on each other’s strengths and achieve our goals together for our borough.

“Our town has a lot to be proud of and we want to continue to be ambitious for our people and places despite these challenges.”