A COUNTY council last night claimed the Government has misled the public over funding, saying it's announcement included health funding – which does not go to local government.

Warnings have been issued that the public are likely to see frontline cuts to council services in North Yorkshire as well as a rise in council tax, after the county council calculated it faces a further £21m reduction in funds from central government.

Although the Conservative-led local authority had anticipated another reduction in its settlement grant from central government, it says the Government’s analysis of spending power is "highly misleading" because it included health funding.

Deputy Leader of North Yorkshire County Council, Carl Les said £36m of its central government funding was actually health services money - the majority of which will go to health organisations outside the council.

He said: “The Government is saying that we’re better off than we were but in actual fact, if you strip out the health money we still calculate we’ll be £21m worse off than last year.”

He said some of the funding was for the Better Care project, which will see the integration of social services and health care. He said this was something they welcomed in principal and would benefit from a portion of this funding, but would lose the majority of the money.

Cllr Les said the government settlement was in line with what they expected, but emphasised the “extremely difficult and challenging predicament in which we find ourselves”.

North Yorkshire County Council has had to make drastic cuts in recent years. By March next year (2015) it will have made £94m of cuts in four years.

The recent funding announcement means it will have a find a further £73m over the next four years, meaning the council’s spending power will have reduced by more than a third in eight years.

"Back office” cuts have already been made and in order to make further savings, Cllr Les said the public were likely to see noticeable cuts. Some of the savings being proposed include ending grass cutting and only cutting grass verges where safety was an issue.

Although no firm decisions have yet been made, its financial strategy is predicated on a rise in council tax of two per cent. If the council does not increase council tax, it will therefore have to find a further £2.3m in savings, in addition to those already planned.