RESIDENTS of Fareham will pay an average of just 5p extra a week on their council tax bill after the council voted in favour of a 2.41 per cent increase for next year.

Council leader Sean Woodward claims the increase - which will see the Fareham portion of the overall bill rise from £123.30 to £126.27 for a Band D property - is the lowest council tax rise in the whole of Hampshire.

The rise, which follows last year's increase of 2.54 per cent, was set at a special meeting last night.

It represents an increase of 6p per week for a Band D, although the borough has the most properties in Band C where the council tax for two adults will be £112.24 - an extra 5p per week.

The increase will be added to a 3.5 per cent rise by Hampshire County Council, a five per cent increase by police and 1.6 per cent for the fire service, so that an average Band D householder will pay £1,161.81 overall compared to £1,123.11 last year. Cllr Woodward told members that the budget increase represented a "good deal" for Fareham residents.

The Liberal Democrat group proposed the same increase, but attacked the Conservatives for "stashing away" too much of taxpayers money as reserves instead of ploughing into services, and argued that some of it should be used for items including children's play area refurbishment, measures to prevent grass verge parking and bus tokens for the partially sighted.

The leading party has allowed for reserves of almost £1.7m - about 4.9 per cent of the total budget - for "a rainy day".

But Liberal Democrat leader Cllr Roger Price said: "We believe it is immoral for this council to keep nearly £1.7 million of hard earned taxpayers money in the bank.

"This represents an average of £40.67 per householder or nearly one third of this year's charge."

His comments were echoed by Cllr Jack Englefield who said: "It's all very well putting money by for a rainy day but for a lot of people we represent it is raining now," while Cllr Peter Davies argued he knew better than the council how to spend his £40.

Cllr Woodward argued that it was "prudent" to have five per cent of the total expenditure held in reserves in case they faced extra unexpected demands from central government, for example.

Conservative councillors also argued that the Liberal Democrat party's proposals for spending programmes had come too late, and should have been put forward to scrutiny panels long ago.

"I would have been delighted to have considered proposals from the Liberal Democrats if they had come forward at the proper time in the proper way," said Cllr Woodward.

Following a lengthy debate councillors rejected the Liberal Democrats' proposals and voted 18 to 9 in favour of the below inflation 2.41 per cent increase.