Government lets Medway Council borrow another £27m
Plus Medway Hospital is doing relatively okay, Medway's new recycle and repair service, news in brief, and more
Medway Council looks like it will be able to pass a balanced budget when the council meets on Thursday, but like last year, it is only possible because the government is letting it borrow tens of millions. We’ve got the full details below. Further down, we have some data that suggests Medway Hospital is doing okay in the grand scheme of things, news of Medway’s innovative recycle and repair service, news in brief, and more.
Government lets Medway Council borrow another £27m
We’ve been talking about how Medway Council is on the edge of the local government version of bankruptcy for a couple of years now.
Medway was only able to pass a balanced budget last year because the government granted them exceptional powers to borrow nearly £15m to cover the running costs of the council.
The Exceptional Financial Support (EFS) system allows councils to take out capital loans to cover revenue spending, something that they are unable to do under normal conditions. However, the long-term collapse in local government funding has forced dozens of councils to the brink. The Guardian reports that 30 councils have been granted EFS this year, up from 19 last year.
In exchange for these powers, councils agree to pay back the money later as well as make savings to reduce their ongoing costs. New rules this year forbid local councils from selling off ‘community and heritage assets’ to balance the books, though it is unclear how Medway can reconcile that with plans to sell noted community and heritage assets like The Brook multi-storey car park.
Medway Council put in a request last December requesting an additional £11.2m to cover overspends in the 2024/25, while also asking for £18.2m for the coming financial year. Medway also requested an ability to raise council tax above the 5% maximum, but this was rejected by the government.
Last week, the government announced that Medway was being awarded £18.4m for the coming financial year, but only £8.4m for the previous one, totally a little under 27m. As ever, the government gives with one hand, and takes with another.
Still, this should allow Medway to pass a balanced budget at this Thursday’s budget meeting, but this ongoing crisis does raise the question of how sustainable this all is over the long term. Across the past two financial years, Medway Council has now had to borrow nearly £40m for day to day running costs, all of which will need to eventually be paid back.
Councils like Medway are piling up debt every year just to cover day to day running costs, and while local government funding is set to be reformed with longer term settlements, the fundamentals behind the budget pressures are unlikely to change anytime soon.
Speaking of the budget: We’ll be at Thursday night’s Medway Council budget meeting, where the Labour administration will be attempting to pass a balanced budget despite technically no longer holding a majority. It should be a lively night, so we’ll be covering it live via our Substack Chat. Our paid supporters will be able to follow along live from 7pm on Thursday, and we’ll have a full report next Tuesday’s edition.
Medway Hospital is doing relatively okay
It’s not unusual to hear horror stories about the state of Medway Hospital, whether it’s a bad care experience, long wait times, or, as KentOnline reported last week, mice on the wards.
So it is perhaps a relief that Medway Hospital is performing better than most other hospitals across the UK, according to data put together by the Telegraph.
The Telegraph compared every NHS hospital trust in England using five data sets and concluded that Medway ranked 38th out of 118.
26.2% of patients still wait more than four hours in A&E, slightly lower than the 27.9% national figure, which places it 25th on the league table. This indicates that patients are triaged and handled fairly efficiently through the A&E pathway, though what happens to them after that is where things start to go awry.
For patients admitted to the hospital in an emergency, 31.1% wait more than 12 hours to receive a bed in an appropriate ward. This is significantly higher than the 9.8% nationwide figure.
Medway's appointment backlog is where it really falls short. 49.7% of appointments are backlogged by more than 18 weeks, below the 41% average, ranking it 110th out of 118.
Cancer treatment is where Medway really excels though. Just 0.7% of patients wait more than 31 days to start treatment, considerably better than the 8.5% figure across England. On this metric, Medway is ranked 11th.
Clearly, there is still much that can be improved. The Care Quality Commission currently rates Medway as ‘requires improvement’. But from the data provided, Medway may not be the best hospital, but it’s certainly not the worst either. Whether that’s an indictment of the current state of the NHS more widely is perhaps the bigger question.
Medway’s new recycle and repair service
It can be easy to knock local councils for their bureaucracy or inefficient response to dealing with issues, so we must commend Medway Council for their innovative approach to replacing a missing manhole cover on Luton Road.
Reader Shea Coffey let Medway Council know about the exposed hole on the street and received a response from a Highway Inspector that it had been ‘made safe’ out of hours.
Phew, a simple and straightforward resolution in a timely manner. What more could one possibly want?
Well.
Yes, it appears the Medway Council method to ‘make safe’ an exposed manhole is to throw an old kitchen cupboard door over it, lay a slab on it, add a couple of cones, and voila! No risk to the public, and seemingly little risk to the council materials budget either.
Technically, the cover isn’t the responsibility of Medway Council, with the main repair work being passed along to BT to deal with, so this is only a quick fix. It’s hard to imagine any fix that could be quicker.
Medway Council Leader responded to a public social media post about the issue by accepting that “recycling of this nature may not be the best optics.” Quite.
We’re launching a second title! We’re thrilled to announce that we’ll bring the sort of journalism Local Authority provides to the rest of Kent with the launch of the Kent Current. It’ll launch in earnest in April, but make sure you subscribe for free to be the first to receive our new dispatches from across the county.
In brief
🏢 Medway Council has submitted a planning application to Medway Council to ask for permission to remove dangerous RAAC concrete from the roof of Medway Council’s headquarters. The beauty of bureaucracy.
🛒 Homebase in Chatham closed its doors on Saturday (22 Feb). While other retailers bought 76 stores nationwide, no one has shown an interest in the Horsted Retail Park location so far.
🎓 KentOnline are outraged to discover that the University of Kent has spent £20,000 to create a sheltered area outdoors for students at their Medway campus. One outraged student says they ‘would only use it if it’s raining,’ which feels like the entire point.
🚧 The Medway Tunnel will close it’s for its quarterly overnight maintenance period next week. The route will be closed in both directions between 8pm and 5.45am on 3 - 8 March.
🏘️ The 110-home development at Capstone Green in Chatham is finally nearing completion. The affordable housing scheme began construction ten years ago and has been beset by problems, including residents being moved out in 2023 after their homes were found to be unsafe.
More Authority
For our weekend interview, we sat down with author, comedian, and new Local Authority columnist Zahra Barri. We discussed her novel, her creative journey, her new column, and more.
Coming up this week:
Wednesday: We examine what’s been happening with the former Buzz Bingo site in Chatham, as development seems to have stalled with the site falling into increasing disrepair (paid subscribers).
Thursday: It’s Medway Council budget meeting day! We’ll be running live coverage via our Substack Chat (paid subscribers).
Friday: Our weekly arts and culture briefing.
Sunday: The first of a two-part interview with Medway music survivors Kyra De Coninck and Chris de Coulon Berthoud (paid subscribers).
Footnotes
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Music that soundtracked the creation of this edition: The Universe for Beginners by Money Can’t Buy Music, The Death of Nightlife by Help She Can’t Swim, and New Adventures in Hi-Fi by R.E.M.