WEST Devon and Torridge MP Geoffrey Cox was one of more than 30 MPs who last week demanded a fairer share of government funding for rural local authorities.

It was unfair that rural communities received less funding than their urban counterparts, said on February 11.

The local government financial settlement for 2013-14 faced a vote by MPs last Wednesday.

Overall, rural residents pay council tax which is £75 higher per head of population, yet receive substantially less support for services, according to figures from the Rural Services Network.

The Fair Share campaign is pressing to stop the inadvertent worsening of the situation this year and also campaigning for a reduction in the rural penalty from 50% to 40% by 2020.

The government has already announced a one-off £8.5million grant.

But many rural MPs argue that it is too little, especially because it is for one year only.

Mr Cox said local authorities such as Torridge District Council and West Devon Borough Council were small, highly rural councils both facing an existential threat from the government's proposals.

He said: 'Although West Devon Council's needs assessment was raised by 60%, the effect of damping is to reduce the overall funding settlement by 2.5%.

'Over the next three years it must take out £1.4 million from a budget of £7.5 million. It has already saved £1.5 million over the past three years, and the five years before that it saved £2.5 million by sharing back-office services with South Hams District Council.

'Where is the council to find the money?'

He said West Devon council had scrutinised with anxious care the '50 ways to save' document published by the Government.

It had already implemented 47 of the 50 measures.

Mr Cox said: 'Only three are left and they might have a marginal and peripheral effect.

'That is why West Devon council—which I use as a case study only— is facing over the next three years the need to take £1.4 million from a budget of £7.5 million.

'It has no serious revenue asset base; its council tax is already at a high level and it has been obliged to disobey the strictures of the Secretary of State by failing to freeze council tax.'