NOTEBOOK: DIRTY OLD DUMBARTON SET TO BECOME A DESERT OF DEPRIVATION …

That is even if the Council impose a widely forecast ten per cent hike in Council Tax, which they won’t, although the figure will still be substantial.

Leaking a high percentage figure in advance and imposing a lower one is an old trick used by politicians to fool the public into believing they are getting off lightly.

They really do believe our heads button up the back.

Reduce or close Clydebank Town Hall
Remove P6 swimming lessons
Reduce Community Budgeting Fund
Reduce Contact Centre
Reducing spend on Highland Games
Remove staffed Citizen Services Provision at Church Street (Council offices)
Reduce school music instructors
Reduce community engagement budget
Reduce community budgeting fund
Reduction in Arts and Heritage
Reduce School Clothing Grant to the statutory level
Reduce Education Maintenance Allowance to the statutory level
Reduce Secondary School management time
Shared Head at two ELCs
Review mainstream school transport
Align 1140-hour funding for three-year-olds with statutory guidance
Reduce Secondary School Registration
Review Secondary School Common Senior Phase timetable
Secondary School staffing reduction of up to 7.8 FTE (full-time equivalent)
Education Senior Phase transport
Charge for instrumental music tuition
Reduce modern apprenticeship investment
Reduce Working 4 U
Reduce temporary accommodation furniture budget
Reduce CCTV service
Reduce corporate administration support
People and change team restructure
Reduce organisational development
Outsource print room
Reduce ICT team
Reduce external funding
Reduce council tax and benefits service
Reduce corporate debt team
Reduce caretakers by one FTE
Reduce elderly welfare grant
Reduce housing benefits and council tax team
Reduce community council funding
Reduce asset management team
Remove public toilet provision
Reduce school crossing patrollers
Reduce footway gritting
Close and transfer bowling club amenities
Close or reduce Dalmuir Golf Course
Cease Care of Gardens scheme
Reduce Street cleaning
Reduce Street lighting
Reduce park maintenance
Remove open space maintenance on non-council land
Remove event support by Ground Service
Reduce Road Network and Capital Management
Reduce Winter Plan
Cease weed killing
Reduce waste services
Reduce grass cutting
Remove Members Secretary
Antonine Wall project
Reduce Trading Standards
Reduce records management
Close Clydebank Registration Office

So, there you have it. The once proud Ancient Capital of Strathclyde is destined to become a sink town, yet another desert of deprivation on the banks of the River Clyde and Loch Lomond.

Top of page picture: The partly demolished town centre in Dumbarton where the public believe reburbishment will make little or no difference.

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Last time I was in Clydebank Town Hall, I got thrown out for having the temerity to want to cover a public meeting of West Dunbartonshire Council. Yes, it was a public meeting. Or it was supposed to be, but the lily livered councillors wanted nothing to do with democracy that day. Or any other day, it seems.

Now there’s a move afoot to close Clydebank Town Hall, which is on the list above of suggested budget cuts. I occasionally many years ago used to cover Clydebank Town Council from time to time. That was in the days when Communists were amongst the elected representatives. People like Findlay Hart and Albert Henderson, who were comitted to make life better for the people who voted them in. Unlike some of the councillors who we have turning up today in the council’s current headquarters in Church Street, which cost £16 million to refurbish.

Their commitment appears to be to make life better for themselves. You will have noticed in the list of suggested cuts above that there is no mention of any of them taking cuts in their salaries, despite many of them having second jobs. One would think they could provide a public gallery from which the public could see and identify them and hear the business that is being carried out in their name. Also they might have asked the architects to provide a press bench, a place for journalists to sit down at a desk and take notes. A table and a few chairs would have done.

Now that doesn’t seem too much to ask, and it isn’t unless you have no interest in democracy or acknowledging the public’s right to know.

It seems that we are paying hundreds of thousands a year for a comms team to let the public know as little as possible about what they are up to.

Now, where’s that item on the list of options for budget cuts?