TONIGHT the council will decide the amount of council tax residents will pay over the next 12 months.

While many will focus on this headline figure, the council tax reflects the huge council budget – about £134m of spending – covering a huge range of services.

Ensuring that we have a balanced budget that is lawful and that we can deliver takes a huge amount of work.

In particular, I would like to pay tribute to the council’s finance team. Even with all the pressures, last minute changes in Government grants and uncertainties about demand, as councillors we have benefited from accurate financial projections from them.

Not all councils elsewhere are as lucky.

As well as balancing the ever-increasing demand for services, the changes in Government policy, new laws and the reduction in our income, we must do so in a way that gives you a chance to comment.

The administration must produce its budget in an open and transparent way, which is why it might seem like I have been talking about the budget for many months.

One issue that has arisen is the very recent government announcement that Swindon will receive just over £820,000 each year for the next two years.

Some may be tempted to use this money to abandon some of the more challenging decisions in this year’s budget, and the medium term financial strategy. Already I have heard some people suggest things that would mean spending the entire allocation for 2016/17 two or three times over.

Sadly, no one making such proposals ever seems to ask what would then happen to services in two years’ time.

I am not going to recommend this.

It is quite clear that over the next few years the demand for adult social care, public health, and protecting vulnerable children is only going to increase.

It would at best be short-sighted to use this transitional money to prop up services for two years.

As we know from our daily lives, delaying tough decisions usually does not help.

There is no pot of gold that will miraculously appear to pay for all our council services that we might want.

Instead, cabinet will be recommending to council that we use this money largely to help pay for the changes in the way we provide services.

This will mean that they are sustainable for a number of years, not just the next two.

This is the policy we have been following since 2007/8 and it has served Swindon well up to this point.