Between November 2023 and February 2024, the Council undertook a widespread engagement exercise to help inform its budget for the next three years.
Over 3,500 separate responses were received from the public over this period which helped shape the budget savings and income generation ideas that the Council then agreed to.
At its meeting in February 2024, the Council agreed a £54.6m package of savings over 3 years. This included a range of savings that focused on redesigning services, changing how we use and manage our properties, delivering efficiencies and on generating income. As a result of increasing costs and inflation, we expect our budget to continue to decrease further therefore it is important that we continue to plan over the next three years.
It is important that our budget continues to be informed by the ideas and suggestions from our communities and our staff. The ideas we received last year have been put into action, but we know that there continue to be other areas for improvement and how we could generate income.
We want to share with you what you told us last year and what we are doing but want to hear what further ideas you have.
Further information is available in both our Budget Challenge Leaflet, attached, and also at: https://www.highland.gov.uk/budget
People can provide feedback through our online Engagement Platform where there is both an online survey and an ideas board www.bit.ly/budget-survey2025-26 Closing date for feedback is the 20th January 2025.
A paper based response form is also available in service points and librarie
Please help us by:
- Completing our Budget Survey – the survey asks for your thoughts on priorities, how you think the Council could generate new income and how it could change what it does.The survey can be accessed online or is available in paper form in libraries and service points.www.bit.ly/budget-survey2025-26
- Placing ideas on our Ideas Board – this gives people the opportunity to put ideas for making savings, doing things differently or generating income on our ideas board.
- www.bit.ly/budget-ideas-board2025-26
Budget Challenge 2025-2026 Leaflet