Further sharp cuts could be needed at Cornwall Council due a further "austerity" driven reduction in Government funding next year. 

While the drop has been called a "bargain" by Local Government Secretary Eric Pickles, a spokesman for Cornwall Council said they would be carrying out a "detailed analysis of the figures to assess what they mean for the council".

The headline reduction of 1.8% is likely to mask the true extent of the funding black hole that faces the authority, with a breakdown of the figures yet to be made available.

The council, and others across the UK, have also been told to find further "sensible" ways to cut cost in a "50 ways to save" document from Mr Pickles.

These include using transparency to cut waste; clamping down on corporate charge cards: utilise reserves creatively and cancelling away days in posh hotels and glitzy award ceremonies.

Cutting senior pay; scrapping the chief executive post entirely and a freeze on councillor allowances and ending councillor pensions were highlighted by Mr Pickles. However that move is unlikly as the authority's councillors have just voted for an huge inflation busting rise.

Spending on consultants and agency staff; expensive ’leadership’ courses, with Common Purpose leadership training, that the council has spent tens of thousands of pounds on in recent years, specificaly named by Mr Pickles.

Cutting spending on head hunters and expensive adverts; scrapping trade union posts and reducing the number of publications and media monitoring was also highlighted.

Mr Pickles said the announcement was a fair funding deal that will reward councils ready to strive for their communities and gives them another year to get their house in order.

He added: Councils must do three things to get on the right road for their residents: put our fair funding deal to work; do every single one of our 50 ways to save; and accept our council tax freeze offer. Councils that cry wolf without having done all of this are letting their residents down.

"Councils that put their thinking caps on now can save precious taxpayer pennies next year by cutting out waste and transforming frontline services that vulnerable people rely on."

 

A spokesman at the council said: "We have only just received details of the funding which has been allocated to the council. This is always a very complex issue and this year has become even more so because of the Government’s decision to introduce the new business rates retention system, which allows local authorities to keep what they collect, and the localisation of council tax benefit allocation. 

The Government also announced that the Council has been allocated an additional £4.874m over the next two years for maintaining roads in Cornwall.

This funding, which includes £3.191m for 2013 / 2014 and £1.683m for 2014 /2015, can be used for improvements such as road resurfacing, drainage improvement, maintenance to bridges or repairing damage to highway infrastructure caused by severe weather events, such as the recent flooding.

With the latest reports suggesting that last month’s floods caused more than £2m of damage to roads and bridges in Cornwall, Bert Biscoe, the Council’s portfolio holder for transportation has welcomed this additional funding as “salvation- hopefully”.

The Council is currently drawing up proposals for the 2013 / 2014 budget which will be considered by the Cabinet in January before a final decision is made by the full Council in February.

The Local Government association said: "Today's confirmation of a further reduction in funding for local services comes on top of the unprecedented cuts councils already have to implement. This is bad news for local services and undermines the role councils can play in promoting economic recovery."

 

The Council says it has already delivered or is delivering on a number of Eric Pickles’ 50 ways to save. These include :

• Share back office services – Cornwall merged seven Councils into one as part of the creation of the new unitary Council in 2009. This has delivered £15m of ongoing annual savings which were mainly generated from rationalising back office functions.

• Tackle duplicate payments – Cornwall implemented this initiative during last financial year and has recovered £0.528m to date.

• Tackle fraud – The Council has successfully tackled Council tax and housing benefit fraud and is anticipating detecting/preventing £1.5m this year.

• Clamp down on corporate charge cards – The Council introduced new internal controls last year, with cash withdrawal facilities removed several years ago.

• Procurement savings – The Council actively manages its procurement process, delivering annual cashable savings in the regions of £3.5m plus cost avoidance of another £3m per year.

• Council tax collection rates – Cornwall Council collects 97.7% of its Council tax in year, in excess of 99% in total.

• Hot desking, estate rationalisation and sub-letting – The Council is well on the way to delivering savings in excess of £1m per year through an ambitious scheme of office modernisation and modern working.

• Closed subsidised council canteens – Cornwall has already done this and is delivering savings of £0.045m p.a.

• Open a coffee shop in the library – Cornwall has already done this in its largest library in Truro.

• Scrap the Town hall Pravda – Cornwall stopped the publication of its newspaper several years ago.

• Stop providing free food and drink in meetings – the Council implemented this several years ago.

• Reduce first class travel – Cornwall Council already has a policy of no 1st class travel • Cut mileage payments – Cornwall Council reduced its mileage payments to staff in 2011 and pays on average well below the HMRC 45p rate.

• Sell services – the Council has recently set up a range of alternative service delivery vehicles which have the power to trade and sell services.