GOVERNMENT money is needed to plug the hole in social care funding and local authorities should not be raising council tax to pay for it, the leader of Worcestershire county council has said.

Discussing his proposals to save £17.9 million by March next year Cllr Simon Geraghty said the issues of local authorities struggling to cope with the demand of social care were not unique to Worcestershire but hiking up council tax would not solve the problem.

In a debate over whether council tax should increase next year, Cllr Geragthy said: “In my personal view, I don’t believe that this is a local problem, this is a national problem that needs addressing by central government.

“Therefore whilst small increases or adjustments in council tax either way can make some difference in the very short-term, I don’t believe that’s the route which local government should be proceeding down.

“Frankly, to address this problem through council tax will see very large increases for what is a national funding gap.”

Cllr Geraghty said social care – which now makes up almost 70 per cent of the council’s £324 million budget – is “intrinsically” linked to healthcare and whilst local authorities should still be able to provide the care, the money to pay for services should be coming from central government.

Cllr Geraghty said the council has already outlined a list of “good housekeeping” measures to reduce the overspend from £17.9 million to £5.2 million - which include scrapping as many vacant posts as possible and cutting staff training and catering - but the council leader said much more was required to knock it down to zero.

He said: “We clearly need to go further.

“My aim is to achieve a balanced budget at the end of the year and that remains the case.”

Bosses at the county council announced last week the entire “shape and size” of the 2,800-strong authority will be put under review as council bosses examine everything with a fine tooth comb in a bid to plug the financial hole.

The council has already admitted it would not be able to make £8 million of spending cuts in the next six months and has said they will be carried over to 2019/20.