BLACKBURN borough residents will soon have to pay 17 per cent more Council Tax - while their Hyndburn neighbours face an increase of seven per cent.

Although Blackburn Council's budget is to stay at £27.1m for the fourth year running, the ruling Labour Group say that a £1m cut in the government's revenue support grant is partly responsible for the rise.

Blackburn's Labour group knocked about £1m off their proposed budget, which sacrificed 28 jobs. But Conservatives argue that if the ruling group had been allowed to spend all it had wanted, bills would have been "sky high".

Labour made the majority of their £968,500 saving in the development services and the community and leisure services departments.

Tories claimed they could save £1.3m but Labour said this did not take into account redundancy payments for the 37 jobs that would have gone.

Labour's budget finance chairman, Councillor Bill Taylor, said: "Having capping limits imposed on local councils is an intrusion into democracy. If our budget had been in line with inflation it would have been £31m.

"We have to do a lot more with a lot less. Our hands have been tied."

But Tory leader Councillor Don Heatlie-Jackson criticised Labour's spending up to the capping limit.

He said: "We produced an alternative budget which would have meant just a two per cent Council Tax rise.

"No one's forcing them to spend up to the limit. They criticise the government for taking away £1m in revenue support grants but an enormous amount of government money has been pumped into the borough in recent years."

Hyndburn Council received a £358,000 cut in the government's revenue support grant.

Hyndurn's deputy finance director Kevin Ruth said: "The cut in external funding has unfortunately meant that we have to raise the Council Tax by seven per cent. If it was not for central government capping limits there might not be this problem for local councils." WHAT YOU WILL PAY Blackburn

A ... £516.77

B ... £602.90

C ... £689.03

D ... £775.16

E ... £947.42

F ... £1,119.68

G ... £1,291.93

H ... £1,550.32 Hyndburn

A ... £501.00

B ... £584.50

C ... £668.00

D ... £751.50

E ... £918.50

F ... £1,085.50

G ... £1,252.50

H ... £1,503.00

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