Timing of vote for allowances rise looks bad from all angles

But Oxfordshire County Council’s decision to do it yesterday – less than 24 hours after announcing a fresh round of cuts to services of £20m and a couple of weeks after their workers were warned about potential job losses due to an £11m deficit – defies belief.

Naturally councillors were always going to take flak over this.

Try as they might to point out – accurately – that an independent remuneration panel recommended the increases, it was still councillors who voted it through.

And, whatever justification about trying to attract a better calibre of councillor is made, when you’re just about to fillet £9.2m out of adult social services it is not going to play well with the public.

There was an entirely predictable outcry by people yesterday and that is our concern about the council leadership’s handling of this matter.

They knew what the backlash would be and they knew what other bad news had been delivered by the council, yet still they went ahead with putting this matter on the agenda.

Ian Hudspeth, the leader, says he didn’t want the issue of the panel’s recommendations hanging around – but still it is reasonable to question why couldn’t this have been kicked into the long grass for three months?

Mr Hudspeth’s problem is now that when he and his cabinet try to convince people affected by £20m cuts in adult social services, children’s services and the rest that they are necessary, their arguments will automatically be judged against this decision.

It looks bad, from whatever angle you view it.

Some of the justifications for an increase for councillors are valid.

There are other councillors that cost their taxpayers more and we should be trying to get a fresh injection of younger candidates.

But there was a time for this.

Yesterday – with council job losses threatened and a £20m axe about to swing on services – was not it.