CUT and cut again - that is the government's cynical attitude to vital public services in Lancashire.

For, just look, at its latest hit list.

Roads: The county gets its lowest-ever spending deal - just £15.3million instead of the £50 million it needs.

Delayed for another year are the vital Eastern Radial Route project in Blackburn and Burnley's Westgate link road. The highway maintenance budget is slashed in half. Schools: New buildings, extra classrooms and improvements are slowed to almost a standstill.

Lancashire gets a paltry 22 per cent of its cash bid - £8.16million instead of the £37million it sought.

The upshot is increased congestion on the roads; more pollution, more potholes, more accidents and more uneconomic waste.

In our schools, it means more overcrowding, more bad teaching conditions and less opportunity for thousands of children.

Just what sense or benefit is there in all this - other than a desperate attempt by the government to cut public spending on vital services in order to create scope for pre-election tax cuts.

They will be targeted at the not-so-poor disillusioned middle-class Tory voters - the same people fuming in the traffic congestion and whose children suffer from these education cuts.

Will they be foolish enough to fall for the trick of being robbed and then bribed with their own money?

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