Falklands : Public Meeting Report 26 July 2011 (Part 1)
Submitted by Falkland Islands News Network (Juanita Brock) 30.07.2011 (Article Archived on 13.08.2011)
A public meeting was held in the Court and Assembly Chambers of the Town hall at 1700hrs on Tuesday, 26 July 2011. Present were Councillors Edwards (EE), E, Edwards, R (RE), Short, G (GS), Halford, S (SH) and Summers, M (MS). The Hon Mr Gavin Short Chaired the meeting.
PUBLIC MEETING REPORT TUESDAY, 26 JULY 2011
(Part 1: The High Cost of Stone and Social Welfare Issues)
By J. Brock (FINN)
A public meeting was held in the Court and Assembly Chambers of the Town hall at 1700hrs on Tuesday, 26 July 2011. Present were Councillors Edwards (EE), E, Edwards, R (RE), Short, G (GS), Halford, S (SH) and Summers, M (MS). The Hon Mr Gavin Short Chaired the meeting.
The High Cost of Stone:
First on the agenda was a written question by Roger Spink (RS).
“There has been some understandable concern about the dramatic rise in the cost of quarry products. Could you advise the reasoning and calculations that caused the rise together with the internal and external rates charged for quarry products by the FIG? Could you also advise the likely out-turn against the estimates for 2010/11 and?”
The answer was read out by the Chairman, The Hon Mr Gavin Short:
Quarry Product Prices: a policy was set in the 2008/2009 budget session and agreed that aggregate costs would increase by 10% year on year until 2012/13. The last two years’ production was unusually high due to the production of aggregates for Project Shackleton and for the oil lay-down areas and the FIPASS container park. Average annual production of aggregate is normally about 30,000 tonnes but for 2009/10, 115,000 tonnes were produced. For 2010/11 over 108,000 tonnes were produced. And for the 2011/12 budget session production estimates are back down to 30,000 tonnes. In 2007/2008, a deficit of £127,000.00 was incurred. In 2008/2009, a deficit of £82,000.00 was incurred. In 2009/10 increased sales resulted in a surplus of some £900,000.00,. In 2010/11 increased sales should result in a surplus of some £182,000.00.
Based on the 2011/12 budget estimates, a deficit of £30,000.00 was forecast if a 10% increase was maintained. It was proposed by the DPW that if private sales rates were raised by 20% instead of the 10% for the 2011/12 season and no raise in 2012/13, it would eliminate the proposed deficit for the quarry section. The Budget Select Committee agreed to raise the private sector rates based on the above mentioned.
Maintenance Costs: The actual costs for aggregates would be much higher if plant hire and vehicle maintenance were applied to the Quarry Section, which is currently not the case. This would raise the actual cost of stone production by up to £3.00 per tonne based on figures tracked for the Project Shackleton sales.
Over a 16 month period the Plant and Vehicle Manager tracked and calculated maintenance costs on the vehicles used for the delivery of stone are some £144,000.00, not applied to the stone costs. Plant hire charges in the quarry to produce the materials over a similar time-frame was calculated at being approximately £168,881.00 – again not applied to the stone costs. This also does not factor in increased costs of fuel, explosives and also shipping costs.
GS: With that I now throw things open to the floor.
RS: You actually didn’t answer the rates – the differential in rates. I did actually ask what were the rate per tonne that was charged internally as opposed to external ones for quarry products.
GS: OK Roger, sorry, I shall have to come back to you on that one.
RS: And were those rates raised by 20% as well? (The internal rates) The internals were only raised by 10%, were they?
GS: We shall have to pursue this one slightly further down the track. I apologise for not having all the information that you were looking for.
Lewis Clifton (LC): Mr Chairman, I am not at all happy with that answer and more so when I think – you said there was something like £182,000.00 surplus. I appreciate that Government has a rather unusual way of costing out things. But Mr Spink, here, is chasing the set of information that I was chasing a month ago and it does seem to me as though there is a dichotomy between the rates the private sector are charged – and by the private sector I mean everybody out-with the public sector but if there are public sector supported projects like the container yard then that attracted a 30% discount, so I am told. And it just seems to me morally wrong in all sorts of ways. And I am further disappointed that the Government should raise its prices against a contract for delay on the 30th of June midday. I don’t even understand the rationale for that. I have in my lap prices which I presume are valid for the current financial year and they are not even dated and they are produced by somebody electronically called the Materials manager in June 2011. There is a great section of missing or incomplete information. But what I do find most appalling is the private sector is shouldering the cost of the production of quarry material. And I suspect the private sector and individuals who need quarry products are also shouldering not the best of management in terms of those high prices. I would make an appeal if I may, Mr Chairman that the Government look at the dramatic hike in prices, which represents 30% over 12 months. If quarry prices are going to remain at this sort of level and they are to be raised systematically year on year, that’s going to do nothing at all to lay the foundation stones for the Economic Development Strategy. Everybody needs rock to build something on.
GS: thanks, Lewis, I certainly hear what you are saying and I will undertake to actually have the answers that you are looking for. I guess to have just have one quarry price would affect any public works that goes on but at least it would bring, as you say, clarity to the situation. But I certainly will get the answers that you are looking for. I would be grateful if you could put an e-mail through specifically saying what you are looking for and I will undertake to chase.
MS: Can I ask you whether you and the private sector generally object to the concept of the quarry breaking even as long as everybody’s charged the same price; or are you pleading for a subsidy? I wasn’t quite clear.
LC: it depends on how the Government applies the User Pays Principal. FIGAS flights are minimal when there’s been huge, huge costs in terms of manufacturing and in terms of fuel and this just goes right off the scale at the other end of the spectrum. I mean there’s no rhyme or reason in any as I can see, price rises – 3%. What does 3% really mean when we know the RPI is up perhaps 3 times that? It just beggers belief as to why somebody should choose a 20% hike randomly when promises were made, which the answer has also said – promises were made there would be a 10% year on year. Now I can find that sort of forgiving, given there have been electrical price increases and fuel price increases and would agree manufacturing costs but I just find it unacceptable. “O well, we got to balance at 20%, Chay, lets’ do it?” without any rhyme or reason of the impact across the entire community. I am rather verbal on this because having seen the revenue line, I know how much I have contributed in all of that.
GS: if you can let me have those in writing I promise I certainly have an answer.
Social Welfare Issues:
A group of single mothers then asked Honourable members about getting back to work as opposed to living on Social Welfare benefits. Kirsty Buckland (KB) acted as spokeswoman and Lynn Buckland (LB) and Deena Jones (DJ) were also present to ask questions. Sharon Kelly (SK) and Betty Turner (BT), Social Welfare Officers, were also present to advise.
KB: Would you be able to implement a system to help single mothers that are out of work at the moment to have a better system to get back into work, even if it’s just for the treasury to take into account how much we pay out in child care towards a rent rebate, since a lot of mothers are working. Some are not and they find it very difficult with the current system in order to get back into work and survive financially. I’ve got a list here of problems that a lot of mothers I spoke to are facing. Some couldn’t be here tonight due to work and family commitments but have asked me to speak on their behalf as well. As Sharon will know I did e-mail about the current situation. Personally I would like to return to work but the current system isn’t helping me to get back to work.
SH: I did actually respond to you on that one and the situation has changed, as I pointed out. Up until fairly recently single parents were not usually eligible to get welfare, I think I am correct in saying, if they were working. That has now changed and I was the one that actually pushed for that because I feel that anybody who is able to work actually should because it gives them a better quality of life and it probably gives them more self-respect as well. So at the moment the way the situation is, if you are on welfare benefits you should actively being encouraged to find work because certainly the welfare don’t want you on their books forever. We are not a welfare state here like they are in the UK – or at least I hope we’re not. I hope we never get to that. Welfare here is meant to be a stop-gap, not something that goes on for ever and ever. And it’s to help those who are down and out on their luck. It can happen to any one of us at any time. You never know.
So to answer your question, the system is in place now to be encouraging people who are on welfare to actually try and find work.
KB: But that doesn’t actually cover childcare costs offset by rent-rebate. If you work out the costs, two children in childcare costs £660.00 a month. Now, how many employers are going to be paying the working mothers £1300.00 a months these girls need just to break even? Fuel is £200.00 a month and Electricity is £50.00 a month. I am just looking at my own expenses. If you translate them over to what Social Welfare are offering, it’s to top it up to whatever they would pay if you were on benefits. This doesn’t take into account getting to and from work, and having your children in childcare. So really we are worse off if we are working. Many are scared to work and they either can’t or don’t want to carry on with social welfare benefits.
LB: I have a mother here with me tonight that actually works more than one job and hardly spends enough time with her daughter in order to make it even and get money enough to buy food, which obviously doesn’t build a good relationship with her daughter.
SH: Might I suggest that single parents are not the only ones that are finding it hard going. At the moment there are a lot of married folk out there, too, who have children, who probably have as much as you at the end of the day or even maybe less to actually spend on essentials. There are a lot of people out there who are not earning huge wages. I’m sorry, but the Social are there and I am sure they will explain, if they would like to – they are here tonight – what they do in respect of somebody who’s working and expecting their child to be looked after.
SK: What we do in Social is we have a limited budget to fund welfare in the community and it not only just for single parents. And in the last financial year we actually were approximately £10,000.00 over budget. So in order to include child care out of that budget it would have to be increased greatly and I think that’s bound to the community and it looks across economic policy about how that’s going to be funded because childcare isn’t just about single parents, it’s about families because it affects a lot of families who have to pay for childcare – both people who are in work and out of work. We have a system now which is much farer in spreading the resources of welfare assistance where it is equitable across families. So if you are a single parent – a single person – you get a set rate. If you are a single parent with one child you get a set rate. So we are not asking questions about how much you are spending on this and that. It gives an average price for all families. And it’s for that family to live within their means. And that’s what happens when you go to work. You earn a wage and you have to live within that wage.
Across the world there are problems with economies at the moment and people are managing prices that are going higher. So it is really difficult and in Social Services we have to administer that system and we are gate keepers to public funds so it’s ensuring that it is administered fairly and within the criteria that is set, which was agreed by the Executive Council and the rates.
LB: I appreciate what you are saying but when I was a student in the UK and students in the UK live on about £3,000.00 a year. That was possible. I could go down to the supermarket and do a weekly shop for less than £20.00. I just didn’t buy brand names. Now I am lucky if I can go to the shop and buy a decent meal here for less than £20.00 a day. I am not being funny but the shops are suffering. They’ve got to cover their losses. Prices are going up here. They are not going down and people are managing on limited resources. But you’ve got a whole swathe of people now that are coming into tighter budgets. I used to be able to help Kirsty out more when I had more money. Now I am being squeezed so I can’t help her out and it’s having a knock-on effect right across the board.
We’ve got a lot of people here that are very well off but we’ve got a lot of people here that are getting into the poverty state and somebody has to wake up and realise it’s happening.
On Wednesday we will find out about run-away fathers and cabbages.
(100X Transcription Service)
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