WE'VE listened to you and now we've acted on what you want.

That's the message from Bury Council leaders after imposing an inflation-busting 7.77 per cent rise in council tax.

They justify the increase, the second highest in Greater Manchester, by saying it gives them extra cash to spend on new projects which Bury people want.

Public consultation meetings held before the budget was fixed last week showed strong support for higher taxes if the money went to schools.

Labour bosses have promised to pass on all the extra money they have been given by the Government for education and social services, and more besides: this means Bury is once more spending more on education than Whitehall thinks it has to.

However, they say that other services, also demanded by residents, must not be neglected. So they have opted to make improvements by increasing the council tax well above the Government's 4.79 per cent guideline, which will cost taxpayers an average of 82p extra per week.

So, what will that extra 82p a week be spent on? Here is the definitive list of where your cash is going. 1) Children's play areas. The council will spend £270,000 of its share reserve in Manchester Airport on play areas this year. A condition survey is being done on all of them to determine which ones will be improved or relocated.

2) Dog fouling. Two extra wardens, twice the current number, will cost £46,000. Then £75,000 will go on providing signs, bins and poop scoops. This may involve setting up dog exercise areas which are fenced off from the remainder of a park.

3) Street cleansing. More cleaners and equipment will cost £200,000.

4) Grounds maintenance. There will be an extra £200,000 put into brightening up the borough's parks and open spaces.

5) Area committees. The council hopes to boost democracy by setting up area committees in each of the borough's towns, to start up hopefully by the autumn. Some £75,000 is being put into the pot.

6) Libraries. Longer opening hours, including Sunday opening at Prestwich library, will cost £40,000.

7) Ofsted action plan. Around £370,000 will improve the central support service that the council gives to schools, although individual schools are likely to receive around half of that money directly.

8) Lifelong learning. An extra £100,000 is being spent on adult education although, despite the pleas of campaigners and opposition councillors, not specifically on Bury's Arts and Crafts Centre. Bosses say a quick decision on its future is unlikely - they want to keep the building, but run more "relevant" courses which would help bring in more money.

9) Operation Springclean. This popular idea, where free skips are provided on certain days around the borough, is being reintroduced to reduce fly-tipping and will cost £24,000.

10) Benefits network: some £75,000 is going into a programme to detect benefit fraud. 11) Staff. The remainder will pay for a special projects officer to bring in outside money, on town centre management, legal staff to handle child protection issues, new technology, and urban regeneration.

Councillor John Byrne, the council's finance spokesman, said the new schemes were not one-offs but would continue for years to come.

"We have done all this while providing more than £1 million of extra funding for our much envied education service," he said. "We believe that asking council tax payers to find 82p a week extra to provide the services and improvements that they have told us they want will meet with local approval.

"Dog fouling, street cleansing and maintenance of parks and other public areas are all issues that have been repeated right around the borough during our consultation meetings. We said we would listen to what people had to say and we have acted on it."

Coun Byrne said Bury still had some way to go before it received similar government cash support to other areas.

"That is not going to change things overnight in Bury but we believe that this budget will set us on the right road."

Not all of your council tax pays for Bury council services - around 11 per cent goes to the police and fire services. For instance, a Band A bill for next year is £540.80. Of this, some £481.37 goes to the local authority, a further £40.15 to the police and £19.28 pays for fire and civil defence.

Council tax for 1999/2000.

Band A...£540.80

Band B...£630.93

Band C...£721.07

Band D...£811.20

Band E...£991.47

Band F...£1,171.73

Band G...£1,352.00

Band H...£1,622.40

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.