COUNTY hall finance chiefs have defended their decision to splash out more than £1m on consultants to assess the impact of budget cuts.

The revelation comes after Lancashire County Council (LCC) said its projected finances were ‘not sustainable’ as a result of government austerity measures, as revealed last week.

LCC commissioned PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) to produce a 70-page independent report urging the Government to rethink how it supports councils.

But when asked by the Observer how much the work had cost the taxpayer to produce, county hall chiefs said the bill for the report was £180,000 – and it formed part of a broader bill for consultants costing £1.03m.

The Statutory Services Review showed that the council will need to make savings of £148m in 2020/21, even allowing for 3.99 per cent council tax hikes every year for the next four years.

It forecast that reserves – being used to balance the budget – will run out in 2018/19 and showed that adult social care, corporate services, public health, waste, education and highways would bear the brunt of cuts.

Coun Tony Dobson, Hyndburn Conservative leader, said he was “flabbergasted” at the bill for consultants’ work in the light of required savings.

He added: “To spend over £1m to have someone external tell you what you already know beggars belief.

“We do know that finances are tight, we never try to hide the fact or the difficult choices that need to be made.

“It didn’t need to spend a million to know finances are tight – I bet the chief finance officer could have told you that.

“The council should be embarrassed.”

LCC hopes the work can explore new operating models to enable further savings.

Deputy leader Coun David Borrow said: “We will be having serious conversations with central government about how they support the county council in the future and this report, from a respected independent professional services company, will give added weight to our case.

“Even if we cut spending on every service to that of the lowest spending councils, something which no council has achieved, we will simply not have enough money coming in to cover the costs of our statutory services, and we clearly need to work with government to find a sustainable solution.”