IN its toughest ever budget Bexley Council is looking to save £1m a month over the next three years and shed around 280 jobs, to live within its means.

Council papers due to be released at the end of the week will reveal the scale of the cutbacks being forced on the council as the government slashes its grant to the borough.

But before any decisions are made Bexley will embark on its longest consultation with borough residents about what services should be saved and what will have to go.

The cabinet will look at the proposals next week which then go to the council on November 17 before the public consultation begins and runs until the budget fixing meeting in March.

Council leader, Councillor Teresa O’Neill said: “We have had to go back to basics and look at what we do, how we do it, can we do it any better and should we be doing it at all.”

Although the figures are not yet set in stone, Bexley anticipates having to save £30m from its £515m annual budget.

Work on where the cuts should fall has been done by Bexley’s own staff instead of consultants.

Bexley already has a pay freeze for all staff and has frozen allowances for councillors, already one of the lowest in London, for the next four years.

Cllr O’Neill says Bexley will do what it has to, to protect is front-line services and keep the borough clean and safe.

The jobs will go over the next three years and pay and conditions for the remaining staff will also change.

Senior staff will lose their private healthcare and everyone will have to pay parking charges.

The council is also looking to reduce its pay-off to departing staff, which it says is one of the more generous packages.

Two senior management team posts will go in the first round of job cuts, but Cllr O’Neill hopes to keep redundancies to a minimum and rely instead on retirement and natural wastage.

The council says it will have to change the way it works, making more use of its website and telephone care, reducing customer care standards and amalgamating council departments.

Parking charges will rise and the dog poo snooper will go.

But Bexley will continue to provide care for adults assessed as having substantial as well as critical needs; will not rent space on council-owned buildings for phone masts and will continue to clear graffiti, lock parks at night and plant trees.

It will also be looking to see what services it can share with other organisations, including neighbouring councils, health trusts, police and voluntary organisations.

Cllr O’Neill added: “We have not discounted the idea of reducing the number of councillors, and we are trying to find ways of making our buildings work harder and longer.”

She said: “We don’t have much wriggle room.

“We hope people will see we are being as open and transparent as we can, and we want to hear what people have to say.”

THERE are challenging times ahead for everyone following the details of how Chancellor George Osborne plans to reduce Britain’s budget deficit.

Schools, charities, hospitals, the police and local authorities are all preparing for a cut in their incomes and so are some of Bexley’s poorest families, the disabled and public sector workers.

BEXLEY COUNCIL expects its government grant, which accounts for £64 in every £100,of council income, to be cut by around 26 per cent.

Leader of the Conservative-controlled council, Councillor Teresa O’Neill says the aim is to keep the council tax low, preserve the council’s front line services and give residents the services they want.

The Labour opposition says the cuts are “too deep, too soon”, although it supports some government proposed welfare cuts And it predicts Bexley will cut frontline services , adding “the pain will be excruciating”.

BEXLEY POLICE are still waiting to find out the full impact of the Comprehensive Spending Review on borough policing.

A police spokesman said: “Whatever the final cut to the Met’s budget, it will clearly be challenging, given the extensive efficiencies we have already made.

“We will do all we can to maintain our operational capability.”

HOUSING in Bexley could come under pressure as people forced out of the inner London boroughs by the housing benefit cap, move further out to find cheaper housing.

No one on housing benefit in Bexley will be affected by the cap.

CHARITIES and voluntary groups in the borough have already been in talks with the council about possible cuts in their council grants, which in turn may limit the services the voluntary groups can provide for the community.

TRANSPORT costs will rise with fares increasing from January.

One day travelcards for zones two to six and one to five are being scrapped.

The Oyster pay-as-you go bus fare will increase by 10p to £1.30p and on the Tube, the zone one pay-as-you-go fare will rise by 10p to £1.90.

The child off-peak paper one day travelcard is going up from £2 to £3.