Tory leader’s letter used to taunt Boris

A LETTER written by the Conservative leader of Lancashire County Council calling on the Government to “fully reimburse” local authorities for the cost of the coronavirus crisis has been quoted in the Commons - by the leader of the Labour Party.

Speaking during Prime Minister’s Questions, Sir Keir Starmer produced the correspondence in which County Coun Driver - writing on behalf of all 15 council leaders in Lancashire - asked for an assurance from Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick that local government would not be left worse off.

“These are the Prime Minister’s council leaders - he must have known about this for months, why has he been so slow to act?” the opposition leader asked.

Boris Johnson rejected

●● County Coun Geoff Driver the charge of tardiness and outlined £3.2bn in additional support provided for local authorities since March - along with £600m specifically for social care.

Asked whether he was comfortable being used by the Labour frontbench to taunt to the PM, County

Coun Driver said: “It’s not a question of being happy or not - it’s factually accurate.

“It wasn’t a letter having a go - it was pointing out that we’re really grateful for the support we’re being given, but asking government to be aware that it doesn’t even come close to the extra costs we’re going to incur.”

The letter - which was written over a month ago - expresses “deep disappointment” that the local government system in Lancashire as a whole received £6m less in the second tranche of emergency funding handed out at the end of April than it did the first back in March. This was largely due to the a change in the way it was calculated - moving from a formula which assesses the relative needs of an area to one based purely on population.