HOME owners on Teesside could face an additional council tax burden and be asked to pay almost 60 per cent more for policing this year, it was revealed yesterday.

Cleveland Police Chief Constable Barry Shaw told a meeting of Cleveland Police Authority that the cash-strapped force needed to make up a £6.6m shortfall in its 2002-3 budget to cover pay rises, price increases and police pensions.

He said one way of doing that was to get the cash from tax payers on Teesside - by dramatically upping the precept levied by the police authority.

Last year, Band A home owners paid £46.34 for police services out of their council tax. But if the figures put forward yesterday are agreed at a meeting on February 21, they would have to pay £73.07 for policing - a crushing 58 per cent increase.

Alf Illingworth, a magistrate and member of the authority, described the situation as "a financial disaster of monumental proportions" and said the extra cost was a stealth tax which would hurt vulnerable people.

He said: "The trouble is the people who are going to pay for it, the general public, haven't got that sort of increase coming into their income this year.

"We have got a situation where managing the finances of public services is like Alice in Wonderland. It's a nightmare."

Alan Clark, a Stockton borough councillor and retired police officer, blamed the Government for failing to give the force sufficient funding.

"An increase levied by us is an extra increase through the back door," he said. "We get the blame and not the Government for increasing the council tax when, in reality, we have no option but to do so if we are going to provide an adequate sort of service."

But police authority chairman, Councillor Ken Walker said people would not mind the extra cost if it meant crime was tackled effectively.

"The worst we are talking about is less than 50p a week to actually provide the chief constable with the ability to provide services. They (the public) want us to do better. What would the cost be if we don't provide the resources?"