Confusion mounts over Reform UK's Leicestershire County Council audit plan

New leader Dan Harrison told councillors at a scrutiny meeting on Monday, June 9 that he is instead “looking at” bringing in an external body to help the council work out where it can cut costs rather than using Reform UK volunteers.

He added, for him, working with an outside organisation would be “preferable” as the council needs a “proper, thought-out scheme with a reliable partner” who can help the council save the money it needs to rather than “just com[ing] in and bang[ing] a big drum and sav[ing] a few million here and there”. Currently, the authority needs to cut around £90 million from its day-to-day spending over the coming years to balance its books, something it is legally bound to do.

However, Reform UK said that party bosses “expected” all of the councils it controlled to “welcome” the audit team in order to “deliver what the people voted for”. A spokesman added that Cllr Harrison “may have misunderstood what was involved with the unit” and the party is “hoping” it can “reassure him” so the audit “can go ahead”.

Cllr Harrison’s announcement prompted questions from elected members over additional expense for residents. Reform UK had previously said its audit team is made up of volunteers working for no cost to the tax payer.

“Inevitably,” Cllr Harrison responded, “there will be a cost. [For] outside sources of the style and standard and professionalism needed, there would be a cost.”

However, the leader would not be drawn on timescales for the future audit, simply saying it was “being dealt with with reasonable haste”. The authority is “in the process” of putting a tender out for an audit partner, Cllr Harrison added.

He said: “It is really serious, and we inherited a really, really bad hand. We’ve now got to deal with it and we are.” Leicestershire County Council has long prided itself on being one of the most efficient upper-tier authorities in the country.

The Reform UK spokesman said: “The [audit] team consists of professional forensic auditors and data analysts providing their services free of charge as a tool to help councils uncover and cut waste. We expect every Reform-controlled council to welcome them in order to deliver what people voted for on May 1.”

Questions were also asked over council tax rates, something Cllr Harrison has said he ultimately wants to cut. Conservative councillor James Poland asked how much a freeze in the charge would increase the money the authority needs to find through savings.

Officers on the council said that for every one per cent increase in council tax, that generates around £4 million for the authority. They have worked an assumption of a three per cent rise each year into their calculations. Freezing council tax then would require around £40 million of additional savings to be found for the remainder of the current financial plan, they said.