Parents feel the pinch of last year's County Council budget cuts

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Mon 22nd Sep 2008

Parents on low incomes are suffering at the hands of the county council this month. Last year the Tory-run County Council cut the subsidy paid to parents on low incomes to assist them buying school uniforms.

This cut would not have been noticed by parents until they approached the council for the forms to get assistance. Liberal Democrat Education Spokesperson Aislinn Lee said: 'We are all feeling the credit crunch affect us and parents on low incomes will be struggling to decide how best to afford to dress their children in an imposed uniform.'

Aislinn continued: 'One parent in Watford told us how she had paid almost £350 to dress her three children to the acceptable school standard. The cost of uniforms can be anything up to £266 per child according to some research recently carried out by the Centre for Economics and Business Research.'

The Liberal Democrat group on the County Council will be writing to the Conservative administration to ask that this decision be reversed given the current economic climate.