COUNCIL leader Keith House has lashed the government for "short- changing the people of Eastleigh" following Whitehall's announcement of local government spending figures for next financial year.

The Liberal Democrat council leader is predicting a £3 increase on the current £129.09 council tax bill for the borough element of a Band D property in Eastleigh's non-parished area - unless the authority can make savings or budget adjustments.

Eastleigh's standard spending assessment rose from £10.2m for the current financial year to £10.7m and the total amount of external funding went up from £6.4m to £6.5m.

But the Liberal Democrat council leader said the council had been expecting a 4.5 per cent rise instead of the 2.5 per cent they had been given.

The "killer" was that the government had deleted 20 per cent of Eastleigh's revenue support grant.

Cllr House said: "In cash terms it is £420,000 less than the current year when we would have expected, with inflation, that it would have risen by two to three per cent."

He said Eastleigh had recovered some of the loss by an increase in its business rate income.

But Cllr House added: "It is quite clear that the government is penalising successful local authorities and expecting council tax payers to pick up more of the cost of local services.

"It's Tory tricks from a Labour government."

He added: "Our task over the next few weeks is to look to see if there are any ways of minimising the government short-changing the people of Eastleigh."

Tory leader Councillor Godfrey Olson said if government handouts had been increased by what was effectively the inflation rate it gives the borough council little room for manoeuvre.

He added: "I hope there will not need to be cuts and that we would, at least, be able to maintain our services. More than anything, we have got to look at the efficiency of the operation."

But Eastleigh Labour group leader Councillor Peter Luffman said: "Just because a council estimates it is going to get 4.5 per cent doesn't mean that a government has to give them it.

"At the end of the day we have had a 2.5 per cent increase, which is above inflation, so I presume there should be no cuts. I don't think our staff had a 2.5 per cent pay rise this year so we should be making some money on that as well."

Councillor Luffman added that the government had said its major aims would be to spend money on improving the health service and schools and that would relieve some of the pressure on the county council element of council tax bills.