Nottingham City Council has announced its proposals for the 2012-13 budget, these include extensive cuts to jobs and services as well as a council tax hike. Notts SOS has begun a campaign against the planned cuts and urged supporters to attend council consultation events around the city in order to challenge councillors.

On the newswire: Notts SOS protest city council cuts budget | Nottingham City Council Budget Consultations | Cuts and tax rises at Nottingham City Council | Notts SOS Indymedia group

Previous features: No Cuts in Nottingham! | Resistance to Nottingham City Cuts

The council is planning to

• increase council tax by 3.49%
• encourage staff to volunteer to reduce their hours from 37 to 35 hours a week
• realign management and cut 195 jobs while also reducing redundancy payments for laid-off workers to the legal minimum (this will be the third time redundancy payments at the authority have been attacked
• close the Museum of Nottingham Life (Brewhouse Yard), except for group and school visits
• close two centres for older people, Marlstones Elderly Person’s Home in Bulwell and the Willows Centre in Beechdale
• sell-off Portland Leisure Centre
• cut food waste collection and close nine recycling sites
• reduce funding to Connexions, a support service for young people

The proposals will be voted on by a full council meeting on 5th March.

The council has also said that this would not be the end to the cuts, with an additional £24m of cutbacks required by the end of the spring 2015.

In total the council hope to save £20m to cover a shortfall arising from reduced government funding as a result of the coalition government’s austerity drive.

Notts SOS believe that the cuts agenda is ideologically driven and are urging councillors to stand-up to central government.

Claire Taylor from Notts SOS said, "Council Leader Jon Collins and Deputy Leader Graham Chapman have been vocally critical of central government and often with good reason. Now it’s time for them to put their money where their mouth is and refuse to pass the cuts onto the people of Nottingham. Even a single council refusing to implement a cuts budget would shake the coalition government."

Rosemary Muge from the group added, "The same week the council announced it’s planned cuts, Goldman Sachs revealed an £8 billion pay and bonus bill for UK staff in 2011 – equating to £238,832 for every worker. The bankers who caused this crisis have avoided paying for it and instead the cost is being borne by ordinary people. Nottingham is already a deprived city it needs investment not further cutbacks."