Cameron's Dud Idea?

8.16.00am BST (GMT +0100) Sat 18th Oct 2008

Kent County Council Conservative Finance spokesman has said he had not been consulted by David Cameron before he announced his Big Idea of capping Council Tax for the first two years of a Conservative Government. The Conservative Cabinet Member said that KCC would have to cut over £80 million from its budget if Council Tax was not to go up next year, and that this would be "a difficult challenge" to achieve. Asked by Trudy if he thought David Cameron's idea was therefore practical, Mr Chard did not answer.

After the meeting Trudy said "The County Council currently spends £40 million on Highways, £22 million on Libraries, £15 million taking children with special educational needs to school, and £7 million on the Youth Service. Those are the kind of level of cuts we would need to be making to do what Mr Cameron wants. He must have known when he announced his Big Idea that few councils would be willing to take up his offer of march funding, but perhaps he went ahead and announced it because it was a good soundbite for the conference speech."