A LOCAL authority has approved a 1.99 per cent rise in its share of the council tax after the Labour leadership voted down a Tory bid to freeze it instead.

As a result from April 1 Hyndburn residents will pay an additional £5.01 a year if they live in a Band D family home and £3.34 a year if they live in one a Band A terraced property.

With extra increased levies from Lancashire County Council and to pay for the police and fire services the full annual council tax bill in Hyndburn for a Band A household in 2012/22 will be £1,340.30 and for a Band D home £2,010.44.

Council leader Cllr Miles Parkinson told a special budget meeting on Thursday night the increase was essential in view of 11 years of government grant cuts and the impact of of coronavirus.

He said: "We have to plan for the future. Employment and housing are central to Hyndburn Council's vision."

Conservative group leader Cllr Marlene Haworth said Labour's budget had 'no vision, no strategy, and no support for residents'.

She proposed freezing the council tax paid for a by further one per cent saving on spending and using £200,000 from reserves to finance an new economic development hub and pay for mental health counselling for residents affected by the pandemic.

Cllr Haworth called for the diversion of cash from Accrington town centre redevelopment for projects in Rishton and Clayton-le-Moors and the retention of Great Harwood's Mercer Hall as a swimming pool and leisure centre.

Cllr Parkinson said the council intended to follow up its investment in Accrington town centre with similar cash injections for the borough's other townships.

He said Mercer Hall was now at the end of its useful life as a swimming pool and the council was investing £10m in a 'transformational agenda' for leisure in Hyndburn including a new centre on Wilsons Playing Fields in Clayton-le-Moors to be completed in 2023.

Clayton-le-Moors ward's Labour Cllr Tim O'Kane said: "This Tory budget is a complete joke. Labour's is the only budget which adds up."