THE post of assistant chief executive with Monmouthshire County Council is one of the 70 jobs to go when the axe falls in this year's budget.

The cabinet expects to make 70 posts redundant, but this equates to 48 real jobs which are currently filled. The remainder are vacant posts which will not be replaced.

John Palmer was the assistant chief executive with responsibility for strategy and communications, but he left last year and his position will now be deleted as the council struggles to balance the books.

Many of the postholders will be offered redeployment within the authority under their protection of employment policy. When one stop shops closed their cash offices four of the five employees were found other jobs.

Speaking at last week's special cabinet meeting the deputy leader Cllr Graham Down said Monmouthshire was once again the lowest funded authority in Wales, receiving £989 per head of the population, compared with the Welsh average of £1,197.

He said: "To maintain services we should receive well over £120million when in fact it is closer to £107million If we were funded at the average level we would get £17.9million more, and to get the same as the next council in the table we would need another £5.5million."

He said the cabinet was determined to keep the council tax rise as low as possible because people had made it clear they were not prepared to have council tax hikes as big as they had in the past.

But Cllr Rob Griffiths, leader of the opposition said many people had told him they were prepared to pay for improved services, and Cllr Pam Burchall agreed.

Cllr Verona Nelmes called it "a cut and slash budget" and said it was not serving the needs of the people of Monmouthshire.

Cllr Bob Greenland pointed out that many people in the county would have their pockets affected by the second phase of rebanding, so they did not want a big council tax rise on top. The cabinet has now gone into consultation over their budget plans and there will be a full council meeting next Thursday which members of the public can attend to listen to the debate.