The leader of Aberdeenshire Council has confirmed plans to quit the role amid new warnings that the authority might need to cut up to £60 million from its budget.
In papers provided ahead of a crunch meeting next week, officers have suggested spending on education may need to be slashed by nearly £2.5 million while more than £7.3m could be trimmed from the infrastructure budget in the wake of the financial devastation brought about by Covid-19.
As well as those major cuts, officers have also proposed putting up council tax by 3% to save £4.4m.
And they outline proposals to reduce the workforce by 1% through voluntary severance to save £3m, while saving a further £1m through reduction of agency and relief staff.
The proposals will be decided upon next year.
Council leader Jim Gifford confirmed last night that he will be stepping down as council leader next Wednesday, the day before the full council meeting.
It is expected that the Conservative group leader Andy Kille will take his place as leader.
Mr Gifford quit the ruling Conservative group to stand as an independent councillor aligned with the administration in June, after Mr Kille was elected Tory leader.
He said he decided to resign as leader to avoid the turmoil of a vote. It has been expected SNP members would back him for the top spot over his Conservative counterpart.
Mr Gifford, who represents the Mid-Formartine ward, will still remain a member of the administration.
He said: “I wasn’t going to allow a vote to happen, so I resigned before the meeting in the best interests of the smooth running of Aberdeenshire Council and the administration.
“I put my heart and soul into it, and now I’ll be looking to find something to do with all the spare time I will have on my hands. I wish my successor all the best, it’s a very challenging job, especially just now.”
He added: “A big chunk of the proposed savings put forward by our council officers are still up for discussion, and a lot of those may yet change.
“In this current financial year we’re looking down a big black hole.
“But to do that, we need to add in next year’s budget pressures which were there even before Covid-19 appeared.
“We think we’ll need to save around £46 million by March 2022, but that’s an estimate based on the first two quarters of this year, and the pressures we think we could face next year.
“We’re coming again into another long period of uncertainty. We are aiming on paper to get a balanced budget with £60 million of savings, but hopefully we won’t need nearly as much as that.”