A SWATHE of local services - including Ilkley's public toilets and visitor information centre - are to be slashed while council tax is to go up by nearly five per cent, after a heated debate at Bradford’s City Hall.

Cuts of £16 million to social care were among the controversial moves agreed last Thursday as part of a two-year, £32m savings plan.

Anti-cuts protestors waved banners in City Park as all councillors met for the annual budget meeting.

In the meeting, both Labour and the Conservatives agreed that council tax bills had to rise by an inflation-busting 4.99 per cent to bring in more cash.

But councillors were deeply divided over who was to blame for the loss of much-values services such as public toilets, community halls and tourist offices.

Labour’s council leader, Councillor Susan Hinchcliffe, opened the meeting by saying her group had undertaken “long and hard” deliberations through evenings and weekends to save as many services as possible in the budget, and dismissed the opposition Conservatives’ alternative budget amendments as “populist headlines”.

She called out to voluntary groups and businesses to help keep under-threat services going.

The leader of the opposition Conservatives, Councillor Simon Cooke, began by criticising his own Government, saying he hoped they listened to “voices in local government” about the inadequate funding of social care.

He said his group recognised the need for a three per cent levy on council tax to help fund social care, but that this wasn’t a “sustainable system of support for the elderly and vulnerable”.

But Cllr Cooke also slammed some of the “spiteful” cuts Labour was making and had made in the recent past to visible services in local communities.

Liberal Democrat leader, Councillor Jeanette Sunderland, said that at a time when the Labour leadership were decrying the cuts they were having to make, “some of the things you did spend money on are astonishing”.

She said this included £10,000 on maintaining City Park’s lasers, £50,000 on paving stones for outside the authority’s Margaret Macmillan Tower and £220,000 on travel and hotel accommodation.

The Conservatives’ budget amendments were the first to be put to the vote. These included the saving of community halls and public toilets, as well as the reversal of cuts to foster carers’ allowances.

The Tories’ amendments were defeated and the Labour budget was passed, with the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats voting against it and the Greens abstaining.

The vote sealed the fate of a number of council services.

One of the most prominent is a cut of £16m over two years to adult social care, amid an attempt to boost independence and reduce the number or people coming into care.

The budget also included the closure of all-but-one of the district’s public toilets and between two and four of the district’s tourist centres.

Council support will be removed from seven community halls, more of the district’s public libraries and the maintenance of sports pitches and bowling greens. The role of the Deputy Lord Mayor will be removed.

The decision also means council tax will go up by 4.99 per cent this year, with a Band D property paying £1,257.86 per year. The increase includes a three per cent levy ring-fenced for social care.

Police and fire authorities have already set their council tax precepts for the year which will be added to the bills. The fire precept is going up by 1.99 per cent this year, to £60.90 a year for a Band D home. The police precept is going up by 3.43 per cent, to £150.95 a year for a Band D property.

Anyone who lives in an area with a parish or town council will pay one further precept, which goes to the parish council. Burley Parish Council is hiking its bills the most, by 202.4 per cent. This will see Burley’s precept go up by £15.88 a year for a Band D home to £48.02. The highest precept is in Menston, where Band D homes pay £51.30 a year. Ilkley Parish Council's precept will be £37.43 a year and Addingham residents will pay £34.95 for a Band D home.