More concerns have been raised over cuts in Southampton despite the council finding almost £2 million of savings in the last month.

Southampton City Council’s monthly monitoring statement shows the authority found £1.9m in savings in the last month.

The reduced spend means that its yearly overspend has been cut from £17.9m to £16m after warnings earlier this year that it could run out of money.

But despite this, opposition deputy leader, Cllr Jeremy Moulton has said it is not enough, raising concerns over cuts and the sale of council assets.

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He told the Echo: “It’s glacial progress. The financial position is heading for a cliff and this very, very slight improvement won’t change that.”

But finance boss, Cllr Simon Letts said the authority is “making good progress” in balancing the council’s budget.

The authority’s biggest outgoing, children and learning saw a rise in its cost by £60,000.

Savings were made however in areas including corporate services and wellbeing and housing.

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It comes as the council has received a grant of £1.084m from the Brownfield Land Release Fund as it continues with work at Townhill Park.

Cllr Moulton said: “A 16m overspend is huge, especially given most of the reserves have been raided.

“Huge service cuts and a fire sale of council assets is coming. We warned this would happen. But the council leader doesn’t do ‘financial stuff’.”

Daily Echo: Cllr Simon Letts.Cllr Simon Letts. (Image: Newsquest)

But Cllr Letts said: “The local Tories are trying to scare the public with this sort of talk to cover up for their own incompetence whilst in power.

“Councils are not permitted to sell assets to close a budget gap and we are working hard to keep service reductions to a minimum.

“Like many councils across the country we have suffered devastating Conservative government cuts to our budget, in our case £55 million pounds since 2010.

“This coupled with a disastrous Conservative year running the Council which led to our reserves being slashed by nearly £50 million pounds in a single year and a completely unaffordable freezing of council tax.”

The monthly statement is due to be considered by cabinet at a meeting on Tuesday.