Nuneaton MP Marcus Jones expressed his disappointment in a decision made by Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council that will see funding support to the Citizens Advice Bureau cut.

The decision, taken on Wednesday 23 February, to cut grants to the CAB by 10% means that the local Citizens Advice Bureau will now be forced to reduce its opening hours. The drop in income will also lead to reduced access to advice, staff redundancies and limiting voluntary opportunities. At present, 53 people support the CAB’s work on a voluntary basis helping people with a wide variety of problems.

The cuts in Council funding comes despite the Government having supported Citizens Advice Bureau’s by continuing the funding of the Financial Inclusion Fund for this coming year to help people with debt problems, a funding stream which Marcus lobbied Ministers over on behalf of Nuneaton and Bedworth CAB.

Commenting on the Council’s decision, Marcus said: “We all know that it is a difficult time and difficult decisions over spending are having to be made at both national and local level. However, it is particularly disappointing that the Conservative Councils in Rugby and North Warwickshire have been able to keep funding CAB, as has Labour-run Coventry City Council, when our Council in Nuneaton under the Labour administration have sought to make cuts to this vital local service before making savings within the Council.”

He added: “The local CAB last year helped 143 families from being made homeless because of eviction or repossession. If that did not happen, the Borough Council would have had a statutory duty to re-house many of these families at a significantly higher cost of many times the grant that the Council has decided to remove.

“After consulting on the Financial Inclusion Fund the Government has continued to provide funding this year after realising the problems that not funding CAB could potentially cause to both Government and local authorities. In a similar way, I hope that the executive of Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council will look to reconsider their position and support the most vulnerable in our borough. In view of the importance of this issue, I have written to the Leader of the Council to urge him to reconsider his decision.”