The Myth that the Carbon Tax will not affect Councils this year has been busted it appears.
Yes I heard on one of my brief opportunities to listen to listen to talk back radio this week that the media and therefore you were being sold a pup. Solves only one of our problems however.
As the time to approve a budget runs out we still have no knowledge as to what to factor in. The information is still, as I reported earlier this month, not forthcoming. We will therefore be forced to guess.
And when you guess the chances are we will either place an impost on ratepayers they should not have to bear and at a time they can least afford it, or we will have a budget we cannot meet. Either way we are in a no win situation.
Don I agree it’s a bit of guess.
So what will you factor it.
You must make some provision.
I’m curious just how Council will make allowance for the impost of the carbon tax.
It’s unfair that some service may end up being cut or reduced.
I’m happy to pay a few extra dollars on my rates.
Thank you both James & Sonia. It is a vexing question.
You are one in a million Sonia. Most will raect negatively to an extra impost and will vent that at us, unfortunately. We all appreciate your sentiment.
We are still deliberating. Some wish to cut services and a couple have been earmarked by one elected member. It is possible we will simply add a % (possibly 0.5% as suggested by our audit committee).
What we do need to do in fairness to everyone is, over the next 6 months (in readiness for the next budget), to scrutinise all our services and ask in each case, do we still need to be doing this and if so in what form. We need to do this because the servcies we provide are growing and changing, most by way of direction from the State Government.
In any case it is time to take stock to ensure we are not doing something just for the sake of it. I will be posting on this as it occurs later this year.
Thanks again to both of you.