Essex County Council has confirmed its huge council tax increase of 16.7 per cent for 2003/04, despite opposition attempts to cut it.

As a result, many Band D taxpayers will find themselves facing total bills, which include district or borough, police, and parish precepts, of well over £1,000 a year from April.

The county's share of the total bill, by far the largest part, goes up by £128.52 to £896.40 at Band D.

The Leader of the Conservative-controlled council, Lord Hanningfield, laid the blame squarely on the shoulders of the Government when he told Tuesday's council meeting that millions of pounds have been lost in central grant this year and that Essex stands to lose a further £45 million in future years.

"The reason the council tax is so high is because the Government has decided that homeowners in Essex can and should pay more for their services than those in the Midlands or the north....money has been taken out of our pockets and transferred elsewhere.Subsidising

"What this means in essence is that we council tax payers in Essex are subsidising libraries in Sheffield, art galleries in Leeds, schools in Birmingham, and roads in Nottingham.

"Other south east shire counties had been forced to make similar increases, said Lord Hanningfield.

Hertfordshire is up by 18.2 per cent, Surrey by 18 per cent, Suffolk 18.4 per cent, West Sussex 18.5 per cent, and East Sussex more than 20 per cent.

Although Essex had received the lowest grant increase in the whole country the proposed budget was judicious, he added. "We have balanced competing service demands. We have

made savings, controlled growth, and selected carefully those areas where investment will have the biggest impact on improving the well-being of the people of this county."

A Labour group amendment to cut the council tax increase to 13.99 per cent and a Liberal Democrat group amendment to reduce it to 15.9 per cent were defeated.

Labour group leader, Cllr Paul Sztumpf, said: "The Tories have increased council tax by nearly 17 per cent without justification.

"They only need to increase tax by about 14 per cent. At the same time they are wasting money on privatisation schemes and endless reorganisation."

Liberal Democrat group leader, Cllr Ken Jones, said: "It should have been perfectly possible for the Conservatives to have charged less in council tax whilst protecting services."

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