EXTRA Government cash to cover the cost of free bus travel for pensioners means council tax payers in Oxford face a reduced increase in their bills next year.

Oxford City Council’s grant to cover the free bus travel scheme will go up from £860,000 to £3.14m in 2010-11.

Deputy council leader Ed Turner said: “The extra money for concessionary fares enables the council to keep the council tax increase to a minimum, freeze most car park charges and invest in important community schemes.”

The council has pledged to give £120,000 to the Museum of Oxford to ensure its future.

A further £70,000 will be spent creating a Jericho conservation area, and £120,000 will be spent to save four out of seven public toilets which faced closure.

Tony Joyce, a member of the Museum of Oxford steering group, said: “I am delighted that the council has managed to find a sum which will allow the museum to continue operating until March 2011.”

Pressure from the fares scheme, which this year cost £2.4m more than the grant allocated, means the council still needs to find £1.8m of savings from an annual budget of £28m. Charges for burials, allotments, street trading, taxi licensing, car parking and for hiring town hall facilities are set to increase.

Mr Turner admitted “times are tough”, and added that although the council was not planning to make any redundancies as part of its budget they could not be ruled out.

Council leader Bob Price said the Government had given a strong indication the council would get the additional £2.28m, but the grant increase would not be confirmed until January.

He added: “We are also making the point that we should be compensated retrospectively, although that might not happen.”

Mr Price said a suggested two per cent council tax increase next year, down from 4.5 per cent this year, would mean an extra 10p per week for a typical council tax payer, adding an extra £5 a year to the city council part of the total bill.

Oxfordshire County Council leader Keith Mitchell said earlier this week the increase in the county council element of the council tax bill was likely to be between two and three per cent.

If the council agreed a 2.5 per cent increase it would mean adding an extra £28.26 to the £1,130.62 figure for this year’s county council proportion of the bill for Band D properties.

  • The budget proposals will be discussed by the city council's executive on Wedenesday, before they are voted on at a meeting the following week.