In our manifesto for the District Elections in May we highlighted the issue of the looming debt crisis that would hit Teignbridge. 
At that time we referred to the black hole in the accounts of £3,400,000 that would hit the district when the ruling Lib Dem group had exhausted the reserves held by the district.

In the last 5 months that deficit has grown to over £4,000,000 as the LibDem’s have failed to address the problem, even adding to it by reckless spending without considering the financial impact of their decisions.

The problem has now hit the headlines of the local paper, the Mid Devon Advertiser with a front page story carried in this week’s newspaper.

Officers of the council have been working hard to address the problem and identifying how they can reduce labour costs and general expenses but their best efforts still leave a hole of over £2,000,000 after reducing headcount and increasing fees and charges, which is why you will have seen the plan to have a mid term hike in charges just announced.

But even knowing the extent of the problem, the block vote of the Lib Dem’s passed decisions to reduce income and ignored the potential risks to the services provided by the council.

We need to act as soon as possible to bring a sense of reality back into the council chamber and hold the Lib Dem executive to account for their inertia and procrastination otherwise we will all be losing all of our discretionary services.

Phil Bullivant