We need your feedback!

As you are probably aware Somerset Council have announced a financial emergency and are considering cuts to services. We will not know the full impact of these cuts until February, but we are anticipating that for Durleigh parish, at a minimum, this could potentially affect the grass cutting in the green areas (for example Luxborough Road and Pyrland Walk) and the emptying of rubbish and dog bins. To see the full list of service cuts that Somerset Council are considering, please go to their website and follow the link to the Financial Strategy Update:

https://www.somerset.gov.uk/news/latest-report-highlights-impact-of-financial-emergency/

We need to set our budget before the final decision is made by Somerset, so we need your feedback to ascertain how important these services are to you, and whether the community would be supportive to cover these costs through an increase to their parish precept.

The costs of these services are unknown at the present time, but, as an example, to put aside just £1500 towards these anticipated costs, plus the other increased annual budget costs, would result in a parish precept increase of approx. 27%.

Although 27% sounds incredibly high, the effect of this is £12.75 per household per year, based on a band D property.

If we were to increase the precept to cover some of these service costs, and in the very unlikely event that Somerset Council do not actually cut these services, the precept in the following year will be adjusted to reflect any unused monies.

Please let us know your thoughts by emailing clerk.durleighpc@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you, so that we can take all views into consideration.