In our effort to deliver our promise to provide better for less, we have made substantial savings of over £1.3 million in our annual budget without compromising the services that we provide. In fact, in the last 5 years we have saved almost £11.5 million.
Over 85% of the savings come from doing things better, differently or just more efficiently.
We have reduced the size of our management team from sixteen to six over the past two years, reduced our staff headcount, frozen staff pay and invested in technology to improve efficiency.
Over the past year we introduced a new recycling and refuse collection service to houses across the borough to make it easier for residents to recycle, refurbished the Harlequin Theatre in Redhill and continued to invest in the regeneration of our town centres in Horley and Redhill and communities in Merstham and Preston.
Investing in our parks, businesses and leisure centres
Our budget agreed last week (14 February 2013) has been designed to enable us to protect and continue to invest in the services residents deserve.
We are supporting more people into work through our Young Workers scheme. We will be helping the local economy to grow through encouraging new business investment and the work we are doing to support small and medium sized businesses to succeed. We are putting more effort into helping older people remain independent and enjoy a good quality of life for as long as possible.
We are investing £6.3 million in new leisure and community facilities in Preston, supporting healthy living and active lifestyles, as well as wider community benefits. The development will also provide job opportunities in a key regeneration area. Subject to planning permission, construction should start this year and be ready to open in 2014.
We are lucky to have such a wealth of parks and open spaces in our borough and we continue to work hard to keep them clean and green so you can enjoy them. Memorial Park in Redhill is to get a £1.4 million facelift to improve it for everyone that lives in, works in and visits the town.
We know the economic downturn is hitting our residents’ pockets, so our Corporate Plan focuses on supporting those residents that need it most. Our budget includes additional funding to support residents facing housing difficulties.
We are also working to build on the community spirit demonstrated so well in 2012 and increase volunteering across the borough.
Planning for the future - more savings
Looking to the future, we have set ourselves an ambitious target to save £2.7 million over the next four years. We have already started to identify how we can do this through changing how and where we work to reduce office accommodation costs and improve our services to you.
We will continue to make the investment needed to make these savings while striving to protect services.
