THE number of recycling centres in Oxfordshire could be halved under new proposals put forward to save cash.

Oxfordshire County Council has launched a consultation on its household waste recycling centres, currently located at Alkerton, near Banbury, Ardley, Dix Pit, near Stanton Harcourt, Drayton, Oakley Wood, near Wallingford, Redbridge in Oxford and Stanford in the Vale.

The authority has said it needs to cut £350,000 from a £1.2m budget and has proposed reducing the number of centres to a minimum of three.

Under the proposals – which will be consulted on until October 5 – there would be the possibility of a fourth centre if the opening hours of centres were also cut by 18 hours a week.

The council has suggested three sites for future centres, replacing Ardley and Alkerton with one site in North Oxfordshire, expanding or replacing Redbridge in Oxford and Expanding or replacing Drayon in South Oxfordshire.

Either Dix Pit, Oakley Wood, or Stanford in the Vale could be retained as a fourth, the authority added.

The changes proposed would happen over the next five years, but the council stressed no decisions had yet been taken.

Deputy leader Rodney Rose said: "These are very difficult proposals resulting from the council having increasingly less funding from central government, limits on how much we can raise council tax and significant pressures on social care for adults and children.

"We’d obviously rather not be in the position of having to make these savings, although with planning permission and landowner issues at least some changes would have been necessary in coming years regardless."