SPENDING power in County Durham is now significantly less than the England average and is falling.

Durham County Council says its spending power is now £200 less per dwelling than the England average, and is £300 less per dwelling than in Surrey.

The authority has £1,666 to spend per dwelling, below the England average of £1,839, according to its latest figures from the government’s funding settlement.

If it was brought up to the English average, the council says it would have an extra £42m to spend.

Council leader Cllr Simon Henig said: “Our spending power is below that of other councils despite the fact we have got far more need.”

Yesterday, the council’s cabinet discussed its budget plan for the coming year, which includes £15.3m of cuts to services, an £117m investment programme in capital projects and a proposed council tax increase of 2.99 per cent, as well as a two per cent increase in the adult social care precept.

The increase gives the council an extra £9.9m to spend and means residents living in Band D properties pay an extra £71 a year.

Council leader Cllr Simon Henig said he shared the frustration of residents about the rise in council tax.

He said: “The Government is expecting the only extra council funding to come from council tax payers. I share the frustration around that. That’s not the way changes in adult and children’s services should be funded.

“The government should be funding these pressures from national taxation.

“It’s not right to push that onto local people when these are such important areas and the pressures are going up.

“The only way we can fund it is to increase council tax.”

The Government has just announced an additional £150m for adult social care. Details of how much Durham will get is expected to be announced in the coming weeks.

Cllr Henig added: “It’s welcome that we have a bit of extra resource but it’s very unhelpful for the final settlement to go through two weeks before we have to set a budget.

“It’s difficult when it comes in at such a late hour to spend that it the best way.

“It goes a very small way in filling a budget gap.”

He said that he expected Durham would be allocated around one per cent of the fund.

The cash means the government has given councils £9.4bn in dedicated funding for adult social care over three years.

Durham County Council is planning to make cuts of £5.6m to its adult services in the coming year, as well as taking £2.7m to the budget for children and young people.

By the end of March, the local authority is expecting to have cut its spending by £209m and is anticipating further cuts of £43.7m by 2022.

The full council will meet on February 21 to set the budget.