Thnaks again to _space architecture and management who have made a short video made of images of the WEYES project from the start back in January when Tim Healy and Denise Welch did a photo shoot for the papers, to the open day last week when nearly 100 people came to see what had been achieved. You can see it on You Tube.
We are waiting on the Comprehensive Spending Review next week when the Coalition Govenment will announce the budget for the next 3 years for each Ministry. Hopefully there will be some 'headline' messages such as proposals for Children's Centres. However it is likely to be a few weeks before all the details emerge. Local Authorities get money from several different Government Departments so they will not know for a few weeks either exactly how much money they will be getting. Of course they also raise money from the Council Tax, Business Rates, car park charges and reserves, in fact only about half comes from central government.
When Local Authorities do find out exactly how much money they will have the next step is for them to decide their own priorities taking into account what they can afford. They will also have to decide what services they need and whether these are best provided by the Local Authority or the private sector or voluntary organisations like Children North East.
We hope that some of the things we already do for Local Authorities (such as supporting families in homeless accommodation to get them into proper tenancies) will continue, however it is likely Local Authorities will try to persuade us to do them for less money. And of course some things will not continue. My guess it could easily be February or even March before that last question begins to be answered. So the announcement on 20th October is just the beginning of uncertainty which could go on until April or longer next year.
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