Tories Reject Community Proposals

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Wed 10th Sep 2008

Liberal Democrat finance spokesperson, Cllr Alan Armitage, has attacked the Tories for being mean and unimaginative with their money, preferring to put it in the County's already full coffers rather than spend it on worthwhile community projects.

At yesterday's full Council meeting the spending of a windfall grant from Government was discussed, and the Liberal Democrats proposed spending it rather than putting an amount of £300,000 in the bank. Cllr Armitage explained that the Council's balances were extremely healthy already, above what had been planned. On the other hand, there was a pressing need to help some communities build themselves and become fully part of Oxfordshire's general prosperous economy.

The Liberal Democrats proposed spending additional money on youth work, teaching of basic English to speakers of other languages and a small grant towards Modern Art Oxford's outreach programme "Art in Rose Hill". These proposals were all turned down by the ruling Tory group.

Cllr Armitage said, "These are all proposals that would, in different ways, help communities around Oxfordshire. The amounts are modest but could make huge differences to the individuals benefited. I am very disappointed that the Tory administration was not interested enough to even consider these."