COUNCIL tax in Caerphilly could rise by almost seven per cent in April, while schools in the area will see their budgets cut by more than £2 million.

Caerphilly County Borough Council's draft budget plans for 2020-2021 include £8.49 million worth of cuts - along with a council tax increase of 6.95 per cent.

This would represent an average increase of £97.21 a year for a band D property.

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But the council has said the cuts and council tax increase are necessary to provide a balanced budget.

Of the £2.11 million cuts to the schools budget - an overall cut of two per cent - £2 million will come from budgets for individual schools.

The remaining £6.373 million of cuts will apply across a number of areas - with services seeing an average drop in funding of 2.7 per cent.

The total budget proposed is £17.681 million.

Leader of the council Cllr Barbara Jones said: “Unfortunately we need to deliver a package of savings totalling over £8.5 million for the forthcoming year in order to deliver a balanced budget.

“This is in addition to the £103 million that has already been taken out of our budgets since 2008.

“This has not been an easy task, but thanks to our effective budget management and prudent approach we have been able to protect the public from deep cuts and major disruption to frontline services.”

Funding from the Welsh Government for the teachers' pension scheme will help to balance the budget.

The scheme, which the draft report says will cost £4.173 million, was not included in the Final Local Government Financial Settlement for 2019-20.

However, the report says that the council expects the Welsh Government to fully fund the pensions scheme in 2020-21 and for subsequent financial years.

Following a cabinet decision on the budget proposals, an eight-week period of public consultation will take place.

If the budget is agreed upon, it will be presented to cabinet on February 2 and full council on February 20.