Portsmouth Cultural Services got in contact with the news that Portsmouth City Council have published their proposed budget cuts for the next 3 years, which heavily impact the city’s cultural services. To be specific the cuts include the following:

• £9,000 reduction in grant to aspex and SCATs
• £133,300 of cuts to the Parks Service, including £5000 saving on fertilizer which will lead to pitch quality degradation, £5,000 saving on the Sports Initiative which could threaten some small scale community sports events. £14,500 for 1 FTE Sports Development Team post and £33,00 for 2 FTE Contract Management Team posts which would leave contractors with less supervision and therefore less protection of the use of
  taxpayers money.
• £35,200 from Museums for 2 front-line posts and one technician who builds and maintains all the displays in all the museums to be replaced with part-timers, jeopardising continuity in the museums offer.
• £1,500 less to be spent on promoting events!
• 1 day a week reduction in Central Library opening hours.
• 50% reduction in the searchroom opening hours at the City Museum and Records Office.

And much, much more (for full details see the Council report (PDF)). Yet again, culture facing total cuts of £481,700 is being seen as a soft target.

But you can do something today by join the cause to save the things you love that are under threat. You can post a comment to your local councillor on their website here and they will make sure that it reaches them! Or join the Facebook cause.

PCS suggest that in your post you include your name, your ward and that you refer to the services that you use and demand that they are protected. If you are not sure of your councillor or ward, you can find that
information here. Also you can always write to your councillor by using the Write To Them website.

All a little strange considering the city council are bidding to make Portsmouth a City of Culture…if we don’t make our voice heard now, we can’t complain when cuts take place.