Hampshire Tory Budget Panic - Lib Dem Response

7.37.20pm BST (GMT +0100) Sun 15th Jun 2008

Hampshire Conservatives over-charged council tax payers this year so they could bribe the voters with a lower increase next year - County election year. They denied it at the time, but now the truth is out. They have also announced some modest improvements to services to try to distract people from the major service cuts they are making.

After increasing the council tax by 4.5% this year, when it was not necessary to do so, they have now announced that the increase in election year will be 3.0%. Liberal Democrat Group Leader on the County Council, Cllr Adrian Collett, said: "People are currently feeling the pain of the massive £43.38 Hampshire council tax hike this year - the last thing they needed when fuel prices are shooting up and the economy is struggling.

"This is having a particularly harsh impact on people on fixed incomes, such as pensioners, who can do little about it but pay up and cut back on other things such as heating and food. Yet the Tories think they can con people by having a lower increase during election year. People are not stupid and will see through this Con-trick.

"The truth is that council tax didn't need to go up so much this year, but the Tories wanted to get the money into the bank. In fact Hampshire has over £120 million of council tax payers money stashed away, much of which is only there due to over-charging now so that future increases can be lower. How very cynical!

"The modest improvements to services are dressed up to sound good but while of course they are welcome, they don't make up for the major cuts."

"£1 million extra for pot holes sounds good, but until this year the County Council had been putting £3 million extra per year into highway maintenance, so this really means that the cut is only £2 million instead of £3 million!

"£400,000 for carpets and double glazing in residential homes is also welcome as far as it goes, but Hampshire should be properly refurbishing all its care homes to bring them up to proper modern standards. Instead of that seven homes have been closed down due to lack of money to refurbish them, while the Conservatives allocate 100 times this £400,000 (over £40 million) on modernising their Winchester ivory tower. Comfortable offices in Winchester are more important to them than modernising our care homes!

"Is there any proposal here to reopen any of the closed care homes? No! Or to reinstate the £1 million cut in the Casualty Reduction Programme? No! Or to prevent this summer's major round of bus service cuts (the fourth major round of bus cuts)? No!"

"Any improvements to much-needed services are to be welcomed, but this is just a pre-election Con-trick!" he concluded.