Our Budget Challenge - Survey Results

A significant proportion of those who responded to a recent public consultation have said they’d be in favour of Orkney Islands Council generating more income – through increasing council tax or charging more for some services. 

47% of the 1077 members of the community who responded to the consultation said they’d be in favour of higher council tax increases in order to protect community services.  

In addition, 72% had either agreed or strongly agreed that the Council should increase direct charges for some services. 

The survey was launched at the end of last year as the Council looks to tackle its budget challenge across three key strands – changing the way it provides services, charging more for services or increasing its income.

The survey presented a number of proposals for respondees to consider – asking whether they agreed with the proposals on a scale of strongly agree to strongly disagree. 

The results will help to inform the Council’s budget setting process later this month. 

A full summary report is available from this page  - and includes information on how responses to the proposals differed between mainland and ferry-linked isles respondees.

Oliver Reid is the Chief Executive of Orkney Islands Council.  He said: “We had an excellent response to this survey, many more responded than in previous years – and this is indicative of an increased understanding from the public of the financial challenge the Council is facing and the value that our community place, not only on council services, but also on having their say on what happens with those services. 

“Our annual budget setting meeting takes place on 25 February.  At that elected members will be considering a range of proposals – including the level at which we set our council tax.   

“Elected members have been provided with the information that the survey results gave us as part of their decision making and we’ve also published this on the Council website.”