STOPPING mental health services, selling trinkets and less frequent grass cutting are among measures designed to cut back council spending.

The £10.5 million savings package for the next three years would include £766,000 of savings by cutting back the Council Tax Support Scheme and the Major Works Discount.

Council leader Jo Lovelock blasted the ‘unfair’ funding Read- ing received from Westminster.

“The scale of government cuts this council faces is unprecedented. I would ask residents to think about the effect a 40 per cent cut in wages would have,” she said.

“The average national wage is around the £27,500 mark.

“If you cut that figure by 40 per cent, your monthly wage packet falls from £2,290 to just £1,458.

“It is also clear that you cannot compare the demands on council services in a town like Reading with more affluent places like Wokingham.

“Since 2010 every man, woman and child in Reading has lost the equivalent of £150 per head in funding for local council services. Next door in Wokingham the figure is just £66 per person. We do not believe that is fair.”

Reading Borough Council is hoping to raise £200,000 by selling some of the gifts, ornaments and ceremonial items given to the Mayor.

This will be the first time the gifts have been sold in five years.

Cllr Lovelock continued: “Some things have been donated by the people of Reading over the years.

“We will do a complete audit to see if any of it is stuff we can sell.”

Some of the works are owned by Reading museum 

The council has already found £23.4m of £42m they need to save by 2020.

Even if the measures go ahead an £8m funding gap will remain. Reading Borough Council has delivered £65 million of savings since 2011.

The proposals will go before Reading’s Policy Committee on Monday, December 5.