Cllr. Mace's response to the City Cabinet’s Budget proposals, based on his speech at Budget Council on 4 March 2009, as Leader of the Conservative Group.

“Wages and salaries paid for by Council Tax are such a high proportion of the Council’s total expenditure that we kid ourselves if we pretend we can make significant financial cuts without also causing significant job losses. In this year's budget, a restructuring reserve has been created of nearly £1m to be used for redundancy payments and for paying compensation to encourage early retirements. Instead of paying for services, the taxpayers of this District will be paying for some of the City’s current employees NOT to work to provide the services we regard as part of the fabric of local life.

If only a few jobs had been removed from the City Council's establishment each month by failing to fill casual vacancies when they arose, each such job would have been one less job that may have to be removed in the future by making a post holder redundant. Removing a job from a list of vacancies is essentially a paper exercise. It is very different from bringing an end to the existing career of an actual person, whose livelihood the job currently provides.

A Conservative budget would have been based on ...
(1) using natural staff turnover to gradually reduce expenditure to within affordable limits and keep it there
(2) reducing unproductive spending
(3) concentrating on front-line services
(4) taking steps to ensure that fairness to all local communities was restored, and once restored, was upheld.

Cllr. Mace's comments on any Cabinet based on Proportional Representation

The answer to those who find a Cabinet based on proportional representation to be unsatisfactory is that at present no one political group has enough City Councillors to form a Cabinet on its own. It is the electorate that must change this. Councillors alone cannot do it - and we cannot "go to the electorate" to correct the situation until Central Government permits it (in May 2011). To form a Conservative Cabinet, we need a much larger Conservative Group on the Council. Months before the 2011 election, candidates will have to come forward, and they will need to articulate the good reasons - backed up by numbers - as to why people should vote for a Conservative Council.

Cllr. Mace's comments on Council Tax rises in 2009-10

It is not correct that our City's Council Tax increase was one of the highest in the UK. Taking the district as a whole - the increase  is 4%. As to the City's Council Tax rising by 10.5 % in parishes compared to last year, urban Lancaster residents have been fortunate compared to the parished areas. In urban Lancaster, the effective increase in Council Tax in 2009-10 is 1%. In rural parished areas, the 10.5% increase in the amount paid to the City Council is real...... 

The objection to this proposal was led by Conservative Councillors - who also voted against the Budget proposals in Cabinet and against the City Council's budget at the Budget Council meeting on 4 March 2009, and continue to fight for equitable treatment of parished areas. It was my refusal to endorse the recommendation from Cabinet for a 4% increase in Council Tax and to present it to Council that led me to resign as Council Leader on 4 February 2009.

Cllr. Mace's comments on Local Conservative successes since 2007

Conservative candidates in the campaign for the City Council elections in 2007 had a unified Manifesto repeated on all leaflets. Taking the District as a whole, Conservatives received 30% of the votes cast in that election, compared to Labour's 20%. The downside was that Conservatives gained only 20% of the seats in the Council - but that is not something over which we have direct control.

Many of the items in that Local Manifesto have been implemented, despite the lack of a Conservative majority in the Council. The Audit Commission has recently reported a further improvement in Lancaster Council's performance since it was upgraded to being a "good" Council, some 18 months ago. This latest report is based on objective evidence collected during the recent Conservative Leadership of the Council.