Services provided by Cambridgeshire County Council face huge cuts as it looks to save £33million from next year’s budget.

The council has been told that it needs to find £159m of savings over the next five years, with £33m needed in the first year.

Introducing park and ride charges has been seen as a way of generating £1m to offset some of the savings but council leader Councillor Martin Curtis said that it would be the toughest year yet for CCC.

Cllr Curtis warned that hundreds of council jobs would be lost and non-statutory services would also be heavily affected and be wiped out if cuts continue into the future.

“We are facing the hardest year,” Cllr Curtis said. “We are already lean and we have done the easy stuff and we have done some more but we are going to have to make some tough choices. Some are going to be unpopular with the public and other politicians.”

For more, ssee next week’s Hunts Post.