North Lanarkshire councillors clash over call for mini budget to use new funding

dailyrecord.co.uk:

An opposition group on North Lanarkshire Council have called for the authority to stage a new mini budget and use anticipated additional government funding to reverse forthcoming cuts to school transport eligibility.Progressive Change North Lanarkshire (PCNL) had wanted to stage a special finance meeting ahead of the authority’s planned assembly on March 28, calling for the extra cash to be used for the “priority” issue of continuing to provide buses for secondary pupils living more than two miles from their schools instead of increasing the limit to three miles.However, the Labour administration says any new money is already allocated to existing resource gaps and that revisiting last month’s budget would be “irresponsible”; while the SNP group say they had already proposed to retain the service in their finance proposal which was outvoted.The Lanarkshire Live app is available to download now.

Get all the news from your area – as well as features, entertainment, sport and the latest on Lanarkshire’s recovery from the coronavirus pandemic – straight to your fingertips, 24/7.The free download features the latest breaking news and exclusive stories, and allows you to customise your page to the sections that matter most to you.Head to the App Store and never miss a beat in Lanarkshire - iOS - Android PCNL say they expect a new sum of up to £4 million to filter down to North Lanarkshire, after additional funds for English councils announced in UK chancellor Jeremy Hunt’s recent budget resulted in an expected total of £47m coming to the Scottish Government through the Barnett formula.They canvassed the authority’s other political groups calling for a special mini-budget meeting for the “spending of this additional money”,