Nearly £150m will be spent next year by Swindon Borough Council on its day-to-day expenses.

And the authority will spend £13m on capital projects, such as a new vehicle fleet and improvements to the town centre.

But the increases in spending still need savings of £11m to make ends meet for the revenue budget, which covers expenses such as staff costs, bills and providing services such as libraries, social workers and care workers and hygiene inspections.

Councillors voted to pass the Conservative administration’s budget for 2021, which includes a council tax rise of 3.99 per cent – the maximum allowed without a referendum.

Two per cent of that increase – an average of £124 per every household – will be ringfenced for adult care.

Introducing the budget, the council’s cabinet member for finance and deputy leader Russell Holland emphasised that most of the money would be spent on providing social care to vulnerable or elderly adults, or on social services for children and families.

He said: “Helping those in need makes up the majority of our budget. This means that most people do not directly receive the services that most of their council tax pays for. It is important that we emphasise this to residents and continue to explain the importance of these services.

“Last year 988 adults were given daily help to live independently and comfortably at home. A total of 1,600 people were supported to return home from hospital and 888 residential or nursing care placements were provided for adults who could no longer live by themselves.

“We have invested significantly in our services for vulnerable children and we are extremely proud of our dedicated social work team who help in extremely challenging circumstances. We were especially pleased that their professionalism was recognised by a ‘good’ Ofsted rating last year.”

He added: “We provide over 100 distinct services. Last year there were over eight million collections of waste, 7,000 miles of roads gritted and over 6,000 potholes filled. 580 restaurants and cafes were inspected, 1,320 planning applications determined and 300 school places created.”

As well the revenue budget, the council intends to spend £1.15m on grants to alter homes for people with physical disabilities, £700,000 on demolishing the John Street car park to allow the site to be used for the Fleming Way ‘bus boulevard’, £3m on roads maintenance, £2m on new vehicles, and another £800,000 on five more waste and recycling collection wagons.

It has allocated £525,000 to tackle traffic congestion at Rodbourne Road.

But Labour councillors were critical of the support to local government from Whitehall.

Kevin Small said: “I’m grateful for the money to be spent on traffic issues in Rodbourne and at Bruce Street bridges. I hope the council listens to local ward members this time.”

He was critical of spending £4.8m originally allocated to improvements to Swindon Art Gallery & Museum on improvements to Junction 15 of the M4 on the grounds that it wasn’t the council’s responsibility: “Both the A419 and the M4 are the responsibility of Highways England and not the borough council.”

Labour group leader Jim Grant said: “Just two months ago at the election we were told austerity was over. The government is finding £100bn for HS2 alone.

“But this budget says this council will have to find savings of £48m over the next three years, and the government’s budget in March will likely mean a five per cent cut in local government spending again.”

The budget was passed on the votes of Conservative members with Labour and Liberal Democrats voting against.