Edinburgh council budget: 8 per cent council tax increase approved
Edinburgh's council tax will go up by 8 per cent after the Capital's minority Labour administration won support for a budget it said would deliver the priorities of the people of the city.
Lib Dem and Tory councillors voted with Labour to pass the 2025/26 budget, which also includes increases of around 10 per cent in on-street parking charges and a 7 per cent rent rise for council tenants.
But pleas for extra funding for holiday hubs for disabled children and cash help for Gorgie Farm were unsuccessful.
Council leader Jane Meagher said: "This administration has put forward a balanced budget that prioritises spend on the areas that residents have told us they care about, whilst staying true to the council's core commitments of tackling poverty and climate change and getting the basics right.
"I am confident that this budget will deliver the priorities of the people in Edinburgh."
The budget includes £296m for five new primary schools and five extensions, together with replacement of the Fox Covert campus, which was affected by RAAC.
There is £12.5m this year and next year, for pavements, streetscapes, lighting and roads; £50m to buy or build suitable temporary accommodation to help tackle the housing emergency; almost £50m for health and social care facilities; and £15m to replace Blackhall Library.
And the council is to provide £3.5m for community-based charities whose funding is being cut by the Edinburgh Integration Joint Board.
In return for their support, the Lib Dems won a reversal of proposed cuts in transition teachers and pupil support assistants (PSAs); extra money for special schools; and a one-off sum of £1.6m to help clear a backlog of road safety projects.
Lib Dem group leader Kevin Lang hailed the road safety boost as a historic move. He said: “In nine days' time we will commemorate the one-year anniversary of the tragic death of 11 year old Thomas Wong, who was hit and killed by a privately owned HGV vehicle as he travelled to Cramond Primary School.
“That horrific event focused so many minds on what this council is doing to make it safer for children and other vulnerable people as they move about across the city. And the truth is we are simply not doing enough on road safety.
"With this additional funding, the 2025/26 budget would have the highest ever single year's spend on road safety, £5.7m".
The Tories won funding for a series of initiatives, including potentially extra wardens to clamp down on flytipping, dog fouling and litter; data analytics to get more detail on people’s needs; and a new fund at the Edinburgh Integration Joint Board for IT, telecare or other investment.
Several deputations of parents of disabled children urged councillors to provide more funding for holiday hubs.
Although the budget reversed earlier plans to reduce funding for the hubs, which provide play schemes during school holidays for children with a range of medical and additional support needs, the parents told the full council meeting that without increased funding the service would not be available for all the children who needed it.
They said the service had been "decimated" in recent years, with transport withdrawn and provision reduced from six weeks to four and now two, and from five days a week to four days.
One mother said: "Funds are limited, the number of children requesting hubs has more than doubled, some children who need this service most will be excluded. Either funding increases and we help all disabled children or we keep the same budget and tough, heartbreaking decisions need to be made.”
The SNP proposed an extra £1m for the hubs. And SNP group leader Simita Kumar told Labour councillors: "Not funding holiday hubs is a disastrous mistake. Whatever wins you're expecting today will be marred by the shameful failure to support children with additional support needs."
A deputation from Edinburgh Tenants Federation argued against the decision taken last year that council house rents would rise by 7 per cent a year for the next five years. They said they understood it could now last for 10 years.
Robyn Kane said: “We consider a 70 per cent rent increase between 2024 /25 to 2033/34 will very likely lead to council housing becoming unaffordable for some households; an increase in rent arrears; more people being put into poverty; a detrimental impact on people’s health and wellbeing, both physical and mental; increased pressure on support services; and an increase in homelessness.”
Sighthill/Gogie councillors, independent Ross McKenzie and Green Dan Heap called for £150,000 funding for Gorgie Farm.
Cllr Heap said the council had selected a new operator for the most-loved attraction, but things were at a sensitive stage.
"Parts of the site are not quite safe enough yet for people to come back. And the new providers will need to find millions to redevelop buildings and improve the site and they will need support to make those external funding applications. If we don't give that funding, we'll be making an already very difficult task even more difficult for the hugely dedicated team of volunteers who have formed to give the farm a future."
Finance convener Mandy Watt said Edinburgh continued to receive the lowest funding per resident from the Scottish Government - £2,009 compared to the Scottish average of £2,732. She said she would have liked to accommodate most of the additional proposals put forward by the other political groups, but she could not.
"We had to balance what we could afford with what we felt our residents could afford. There was a huge consultation about this with an unprecedented level of responses and they said 'We cannot afford our council tax to go up as much as it would need to to meet all these competing needs.'"
She said some councils were imposing higher council tax increases. "We listened to our residents. We thought a council tax increase of 8 per cent was fair."