COUNCIL tax rises and budget cuts have been questioned after it was revealed the city and county council underspent by more than £6m last year.

The underspends – amounting to 12 per cent of more than £50m of cuts announced across the two authorities earlier this year – come after both councils raised council tax by two per cent.

Critics say the money should be used to offset some of the savings.

Lib Dem city and county councillor Jean Fooks said: “One could question if it was right to go for an increase in council tax when the revenue budget was higher than it needed to be.

“Given this underspend, whatever they are using it for, people might feel we should review whether or not council tax should rise.

“It does raise the question of whether their budgeting was off or whether they planned to spend less, or if they were just plain lucky.”

The underspend of £3.3m at the Town Hall, equating to 13.7 per cent of the city council’s £24m revenue budget, has been announced after a four-year savings target of £5m and two per cent council tax rise, which will raise an extra £220,000 this year, were unveiled.

The savings were made within council departments and from unspent contingency funds and will be put into a reserve account to fund temporary car parking and other activities in connection with the redevelopment of the Westgate shopping centre.

But the proposed use of the funds has been criticised by the city’s taxpayers.

East Oxford resident Sarah Lasenby said: “I think it’s absolutely wrong to use leftover revenue funding to pay for capital projects.

“I think they should be using it to offset some of the savings they have had to make.

“Or maybe they should give it to the county council so it can be spent on care in the community.”

Calls have been made for the money to be used to reinstate things like the county council’s big society fund, which was scrapped in April.

Sue Price, from the Blackbird Leys Adventure Playground group, said: “We got £10,000 and it was incredibly useful for us. I know it’s sensible to have some money in reserves, but you’d think they could put back at least half of that.”

City council deputy leader and board member for finance Ed Turner said: “The underspend has been quite substantial.

“What we’ve done with some efficiency savings is put contingencies against each one in case they’re not met, and where we have been successful that becomes an underspend.

“What we’ve tried to do is hope for the best and prepare for the worst.”

Oxfordshire County Council has announced an underspend of £3.2m, amounting to 0.8 per cent of its £418m budget.

It comes after the authority announced £46m of cuts over the next four years.

Cabinet member for finance Arash Fatemian said the money would be put into reserves.

He said: “We are not going to go out on a jolly with this money. It’s being re-invested.”