E&S Comment: Council cuts at odds with claims of rosy economy

The argument begins to crumble, however, when the Government publishes its annual dispassionate spreadsheet of figures on council funding cuts.

The usual rhetoric accompanies it about the need to get the deficit down and the mess that the former Labour government left the country in.

But when we are told the average cut in funding across the country is 1.8 per cent and there are councils in the Black Country losing as much as five per cent of their 'spending power', it does start to feel as though we are not all in it together after all.

Councils must accept their share of responsibility for their financial woes.

For too many years the public was a cash cow to be milked without mercy, with inflation busting increases in council tax.

George Osborne's early incentives to freeze the rates by offering grants the equivalent of a modest rise were helpful in the worst years of austerity.

Yet the same Government that tells us there is a long, hard road ahead is now celebrating record numbers of people in work and rising wages.

In Wolverhampton alone, we report today the that 1,000 new jobs will be up for grabs soon.

It will become increasingly difficult to put across both messages in the run up to the election without becoming confusing.

The Government also makes much of its promise that local people will have the final say over council tax increases.

Yet the requirement of any council to hold a costly referendum should they plan to raise it by more than two per cent is really another means by which Whitehall imposes the ultimate control. Ministers know voters will never choose to pay more.

If they really wanted to let people have the final say, they would insist councillors state their intentions on council tax as part of their local election manifestos, so voters could kick out those who take liberties with the public purse.

Libraries, community centres, youth clubs and more have all been cut back as savings have been made.

Councils were not responsible for the banking crisis but they have consumed vast quantities of public money and, it is fair to say, many were not using it as efficiently as they should have.

Unfortunately, however, it is the most vulnerable people who continue to pay the price. And they did not cause the banking crisis either.