THE breaking news from Monmouthshire County Council is that the authority has set a budget for 2023-24. It’s been a gruelling process for all concerned, partly due to the eleventh hour nature of it.

My team had been warning for some months that the process needed to be brought forward. Even then we voted on the final budget proposals just 24 hours before the legal deadline for councils to set a budget.

It would’ve been unprecedented for any council to miss the deadline and would’ve meant a ban on all non-essential spend and likely Welsh Government intervention because the council would have been unable to issue council tax demands to residents.

The minority Labour administration had been defeated by all other councillors in its first draft.

The reaction of some Labour councillors to this defeat was to single out, criticise and vilify Cllr Ian Chandler who represents the Green Party, despite Ian consistently raising principled objections to a number of the proposals.

Following the meeting I sat down immediately with senior Labour councillors and explained what it would take to shape the budget into something that would be approved by the council.

We recognised that at such a late stage we were not going to get all the changes we wanted to see and we would need to compromise. We would have loved to see a lower council tax rise, recognising the cost of living pressures that so many residents are facing, but at such a late stage we knew that finding large six figure sums would be impossible.

So we set about removing some of the most unacceptable budget proposals and are pleased that Labour councillors agreed to the following changes:

Reinstating educational psychology service to help children’s mental health in schools,

Reinstating support for children with additional learning needs,

Scrapping Labour plans for a £2 charge for school breakfast clubs,

Putting £40,000 into Gwent Music to protect whole class music lessons in all Monmouthshire schools,

Reinstating the Community Improvement Team, which works with prison inmates to collect litter and improve our natural environment,

Investment in anti-littering measures including new covert cameras to deter and catch litter louts,

Ditching plans for a 3,000% increase in café pavement licences.

It’s unusual for Labour and Conservatives to put aside rivalries, but we felt this budget was too important. I’d like to thank Labour and Independent group leaders Mary Ann Brocklesby and Frances Taylor for the constructive way in, which we worked together.