LABOUR plans to invest more money in the county’s libraries and an additional £100,000 to tackle homelessness as part of its alternative budget plan for next year.

Labour said Worcestershire County Council's Conservative's budget had "in effect" been written by the government due to its inability to address adult social care funding as a national problem.

Councillor Robin Lunn, leader of the council’s Labour group, said: “We wish to focus what little money is available on protecting and in the case of libraries and homelessness adding to frontline services, to ensure they remain viable.

“However the people of Worcestershire need to know that without a proper solution to the social care funding crisis, as proposed by Labour, people will pay more council tax for reduced services. This is not where we should be.”

Labour said it would not divert money away from adult’s or children’s social care or frontline highways services

Cllr Lunn said cuts to the council’s “hard-pressed” libraries could not continue and vowed to reverse proposed budget cuts and invest £325,000 extra.

The council originally planned to slash £1 million from the library budget over the next three years but later reduced the cut to £800,000.

Labour also want to put an additional £100,000 into the budget to tackle homelessness.

Cllr Lunn said: “No civilised society should tolerate anyone sleeping on the streets against their free will, and we need to do everything we can to eradicate the problem.

“Some years ago, the county was providing funding in this area ten times what it is now.

“We need to focus our thin resources on doing far more to assist the districts in resolving this tragic issue.”

Labour also said it would return £50,000 to the council’s archive budget by reducing a planned increase in the property services budget as well as some ‘non-frontline’ highways savings.

The council plans to cut its archive budget from £700,000 to £450,000.

Labour would also reduce the cabinet budget by £18,000 to the amount it would be if nine rather than ten councillors sat at cabinet.

The budget will be discussed at a full meeting of the county council on Thursday (February 14).