Local Government Finance

While I appreciate that the Government will have increased funding to local authorities by 45 per cent. by 2011, and that the Tories made a real-terms cut in such funding in the four years leading up to 1997, I am sure that I am not the only one who tires of Tory-controlled councils continually complaining about Government funding while taking the credit for Government-funded initiatives. Does the Minister agree that councils such as my own, the Tory-controlled West Lancashire district council, instead of wasting time and resources on doing things such as building a new town hall in Ormskirk, ought to get their priorities right and invest their Government cash in front-line services? The council need to begin with the cemetery, which we badly need.