The first two months of the year are always extremely busy and challenging as we set the latest council budget.
Every year is a challenge but this year’s budget was particularly difficult as we faced a funding gap of £15.6 million.
This is being managed in a number of ways, such as using £4million in reserves, income from a Council Tax premium on second homes, and savings across council services.
Members also agreed to increase Council Tax by 7 per cent. This is one of the lowest increases in Scotland and while we’d prefer not to make such a significant increase we have tried to keep it as low as possible.
We appreciate that the weeks leading up to the budget can be tough and I’d like to thank everyone for their patience and support during this period. As always, the senior management team have been a huge help and have worked tirelessly to ensure we can provide a budget that is fair and equitable as possible.
This year, over 4,000 people took part in the budget consultation and that’s a fantastic turnout and we have listened to the views of our residents when finalising our proposals. The findings of which will also help inform future budget setting exercises.
If you wish to find out more about the setting of the budget or the findings of the consultation exercise papers are available on the council’s website.
The last couple of months have also been significant as we’ve seen two of our Ayrshire Growth Deal projects move forward.
In February, we held a groundbreaking ceremony to formally commencing physical works on our Great Harbour project at Irvine Harbourside.
The ‘Great Harbour’ is a key component of the £251m Ayrshire Growth Deal and one of the most ambitious and transformational regeneration tourism proposals for the region.
Contractors McLauglin Construction are carrying out the first phase works – called the ‘Coastal Hub’ – which will include the development of a themed regional playpark. A skatepark is also being constructed, while there will be repairs to the Pilot House building and new landscaped park setting that reflects the coastal location, improved active travel connections and the re-lining of the Beach Drive car park to increase capacity. We look forward to seeing work progress over the coming months
And just a few days later, we were at Booth Welsh in Irvine to mark the opening of the new Digital Process Manufacturing Centre (DPMC). The DPMC is part of the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland (NMIS) and will give process manufacturing businesses access to digital and data driven manufacturing expertise enhancing their skills to compete in a rapidly transitioning area. We are a proud partner in this project which is being funded in part through the Ayrshire Growth Deal.
With the remediation works close to completion on the new Ardrossan Coastal Quartersite – which includes the new Education and Community Campus – we have many exciting regeneration projects happening. We will provide updates over the coming months.
We were also delighted to launch CHES – Collaboration of Health Equity in Scotland – in February. We are one of three Scottish local authorities that are collaborating with health experts on ways to improve health and well-being for residents.
The wide-ranging partnership will examine ways to strengthen and accelerate actions that will reduce health inequities for people living in North Ayrshire, Aberdeen City and South Lanarkshire.
Health boards in each of the three areas will also work alongside Public Health Scotland (PHS) and University College London’s Institute of Health Equity (IHE), on the two-year-long Collaboration for Health Equity in Scotland.
We look forward to working with our colleagues to help make life better for residents here in North Ayrshire.
I’d just like to finish by taking this opportunity to once again thank staff for their herculean effort during Storm Éowyn. So many of our teams were involved in supporting our most vulnerable residents and ensuring people remained safe and secure during some of the worst weather we’ve ever experienced. I was extremely proud of how we responded and delivered in the most challenging of circumstances.