Councillor Jim Logue, leader of North Lanarkshire Council, said: “On the face of it today’s budget announcement appears to do little to bridge our estimated £60million budget gap over the next three years.
“The announced increase to the local government grant may indeed cover the council tax freeze but it must also provide for the nationally agreed staff pay increase that was awarded last year.
“Faced with £60 million in cuts over the next three years, we may be witnessing the tipping point in terms of our ability to deliver vital services that matter so much to people and communities.
“As we know from previous experience, the devil is always in the detail and until we are able to interrogate all the information over the coming days and weeks we will be unable to say with certainty what the impacts are.
“The reality is that we are required to deliver more services than we did 10 years ago, yet this council’s budget has been cut by more than £209 million in the last decade. And continued ring-fencing of funding, the impact of inflation and real-terms reductions mean some of the most valued local services are under threat. Difficult decisions will still need to be made to deliver a balanced budget in the new year.”