Savings targets
The council has worked hard to deliver significant savings over recent years in order to keep council tax increases down and to meet additional costs of the government initiatives. Over the past 3 years, the council has made savings of £670k in 2005/06, £483k in 2006/07 and £1.6m in 2007/08. The council is unlikely to be able to deliver further savings without significantly affecting service delivery, since most routes have already been exhausted. Whilst the council is pursuing options for alternative delivery mechanism, it many may not deliver the levels of savings required within the short term hence the council may be faced with having to make some difficult decisions in order to balance the books.