"Doomsday" for Kirklees if cuts to park maintenance go ahead

Peter Fawcett from Cleckheaton, who spent 32 years working for Kirklees Council’s Parks Department, has spoken of the implications of the council’s plans to reduce grounds maintenance services, describing the situation as “dire.”

Mr Fawcett has said that the national Government need to take action to save parks and prevent the country from going to wrack and ruin.

This comes as last week, a council report revealed that workforce pressures mean that Kirklees residents can expect to see the number of times grass is cut at public spaces across the borough reduced.

Problems with the budget, difficulties in recruiting staff and a 20 per cent vacancy rate were all said to be contributing to the mounting pressures. As a solution, council officers are proposing that the grass at some public spaces be cut every four weeks.

However, Mr Fawcett condemned this approach and explained that grass being cut less often “defies nature.”

He said: “When I was cutting for the council, I would work in my own time to cut grass every ten days. It can’t go longer than that because grass is unforgiving. Grass won’t stop growing because there is no money.”

Mr Fawcett also raised the point that Kirklees Council agreed to give a £3.5m cash injection to Kirklees Active Leisure (KAL) in July 2021 using council reserves, yet is prepared to sacrifice parks.

He said: “I’ve been talking to some other gardeners and they can’t understand why the parks have no budget. The parks can’t rely on handouts from other people

“KAL is simply a modern quango, it hasn’t got 200 years of history like the parks department.

“Someone needs to make a stand. Either refuse to take on more work without funding or find more funding, but this seemingly isn’t there.”

The maintenance team receives no central funding from the council but instead relies on contracts with other departments within the council to generate its income. These include Kirklees Homes and Neighbourhoods, Highways, Academy Schools and KAL.

According to Mr Fawcett, since the news of service cuts has broken, gardeners are considering early retirement as “they’re going to get out before the ship sinks.”

Kirklees Council previously made cutbacks to the grounds maintenance department in 2015 when £1.3m was slashed from the budget. At this time, the borough’s parks were put into one of four categories – gold, silver, bronze or natural. This would dictate how often the grass would be trimmed.

Gold sites included the borough’s main parks and crematorium such as Crow Nest Park, Wilton Park and Dewsbury Crematorium. These received 20 grass cuts annually. The silver category covered recreation grounds with facilities like those at Mirfield Showground and would get 14 cuts a year. Bronze sites such as highway verges and greenways received six cuts annually, and small sites or ‘natural zones’ were left to grow freely.

Council officers propose the category system is used once again with those in the silver and bronze categories being lumped together, having their grass cut every four weeks as an “interim measure.”

The issue will be considered by the council’s Economy and Neighbourhoods Scrutiny Panel today (10 January).