HEREFORDSHIRE Council has been challenged to take its electorate to court if council tax payers refuse payments in protest against service cuts.

Councillor Mark Hubbard, group leader with It’s Our County (IOC) said: “These are the services that people value so give them a reason to pay their council tax - if you take them away why on earth would people pay their council tax? You cannot take everyone to court.”

The council goes into an annual meeting next Friday with its very future staked on a new 2013/14 budget programme that has to cover an £8.4m shortfall on an already tough budget programme passed in February and since found to be flawed.

That budget pitched £14.9m savings in 2013-14 alone, but £3.8m of income was subsequently found to have been double-counted and £4.6m of savings judged undeliverable.

Last month,  Cabinet was told of a need to find an additional £8.4m of savings from elsewhere in the budget to compensate for the errors.

IOC claims the budget passed in February was “illegal” either because it wasn’t balanced due to the double-counting error; or because the council was misled over the deliverability of the savings.

A cabinet debate and vote on the principle of cuts to all non-statutory services from public toilets to libraries was deferred - in the face of growing and vociferous opposition – to full council on Friday.

Coun Hubbard urged a strong public presence at the Shirehall debate next Friday afternoon.

“As a county we are now entering the storm that It’s Our County has been urging this council to prepare for since before the 2011 elections. I  am angry and disappointed on behalf of the residents of this county who have so far been denied a choice and a voice in this matter,” he said.

In February IOC as group voted against the proposed budget as undeliverable and challenged the council to trigger a referendum by proposing a “realistic” council tax rise of more than two per cent.

“Doing so would have triggered a referendum - giving Herefordshire residents the chance to choose whether to reduce the budget and approve the level of cuts we are now facing; or to recognise the social benefit of retaining such services as our libraries, parks, museums and vote to collectively share the cost of maintaining these through higher council tax payments,” said Coun Hubbard.

Friday’s debate and vote was now about what kind of society the future county was going to be, he said.