Council will have central funding cut by 2.3%

Rochdale Borough Council will have central funding cut by 2.3% in 2013/14.

Communities Secretary Eric Pickles said said other measures meant overall that councils' "spending power" would be 1.7% lower.

Labour's Hilary Benn insisted that local services in England's poorest areas would be hit hardest by the cuts.

Mr Pickles was "living in world of his own", he said.

In a Commons statement, the communities secretary said "this is a fair settlement, fair to the north and the south, fair to rural and urban".

"All councils have a moral duty to freeze council tax," he told MPs, announcing that any attempt to raise council tax by more than 2% would result in a local referendum.