Public services in Monmouthshire are braced for cuts as budget reductions bit every local authority in Wales last week.

All 22 Welsh councils will face a real-terms cut in funding from next April, as inflation — estimated at 1.5 percent — erodes even the increased budgets of ten councils for 2017/18.

Monmouthshire’s budget of £91.62m, is down £23,000 on the previous year, or less than 0.1 per cent.

Councillor Peter Fox,  Leader of Monmouthshire County Council said, “The announcement…shows that the Welsh Government has listened on a number of key issues including the distribution formula. 

“However, we still need to make sure that the system takes account of the additional needs of providing services in communities with diverse needs and especially the additional costs of providing services in rural communities. 

“We look forward to the UK Government’s Autumn Statement, when we will get a clearer picture of the Welsh Government’s budget allocations for future years. 

“We will look forward to working with the Welsh Government to align any future funding with the £600 million of pressures that face local government over the next three years running up to 2019-20.”

Councillor Phil Murphy, Monmouthshire’s cabinet member for resources said that the funding arrangements were more favourable than previous years.

“This settlement is considerably better than expected and takes some of the pressure off the council’s finances. However, additional pressures on our budget for 2017/18 represent a considerable and continuing problem,” he said.

Budgets are set on a needs-based formula which takes into account expected levels of Council Tax revenue, a system which has caused concern for MCC as whilst receipts are higher than less prosperous areas, the costs of service delivery across rural counties differ from urban areas such as Newport.

Overall, local authorities will see a small increase in funding of £3.8m to £4.1bn.

This is the first increase in the local government settlement in four years.