A plan to reverse cuts to services by slashing senior managers’ salaries was branded a “fantasy budget” by the Conservatives.

Barnet Labour Group’s alternative budget for the coming financial year proposed saving £1.1 million by cutting the wages of some of the council’s most senior employees.

Along with other savings, the group claimed this would allow the council to scrap the controversial £70-a-year charge for garden waste collections, clean up the borough’s streets and pay all care workers the London living wage.

But Tory councillors branded the plans a “fantasy budget” after the council’s finance chief warned they could lead to recruitment problems, redundancy payouts and a rise in agency staff.

The budget plans were discussed at a meeting of the full council on Tuesday (March 3).

Deputy Labour leader Cllr Ross Houston (West Finchley) told the meeting the budget drawn up by the Conservative administration was “balanced on the backs of the poor and those most in need.”

Cllr Houston said: “Most of the cuts fall disproportionately on the poor, elderly, disabled, and on children – particularly in adults’ and children’s social care.”

He pointed out that more than 9,000 people had so far signed a petition calling for the “stealth garden tax” to be scrapped.

Cllr Houston said the Labour plans involved shaving thousands of pounds off senior employees’ salaries, as well as “getting rid of so-called executive director chairs and merging a few roles”.

But while the council’s finance chief, Anisa Darr, said in a written comment on the Labour budget that the savings were possible, she urged caution.

Ms Darr warned lower salaries meant the council could struggle to attract “potential leaders” and make existing staff “eligible for redundancy payments”.

Cllr Peter Zinkin (Conservative, Childs Hill), accused the Barnet Labour Group of “living in a bubble”.

He said: “The decision to charge for green waste follows that of all the surrounding boroughs. We will be using the money raised to invest in our services, as well as balance the budget.

“What does Labour propose in its budget? The fantasy budgeting of Corbyn and McDonnell – promise, promise, promise, in the hope of getting votes with fantasy cost reductions that they know are not deliverable.”

The Liberal Democrats unveiled plans to plug a “black hole” in the council’s budget by increasing core council tax by more than the 1.99 per cent planned by the Tories, which would trigger a referendum.

They claimed this would allow the council to raise an extra £16 million, which would close this year’s budget gap and boost the council’s reserves.

Lib Dem leader Cllr Gabriel Rozenberg (Garden Suburb) said the Tories’ budget, which includes cumulative savings of almost £93 million over five years, represented “the sharpest collapse in the borough’s finances in living memory”.

He added: “We say that this is a black hole in Barnet’s finances because, without radical action, it will lead to the bankruptcy of this council – and it will do so very fast.

“We need an honest, borough-wide reckoning of the council’s true, ongoing spending – and then this autumn we say, put it to the people of Barnet, tell them, ‘this is the tax rise we actually need’.”

But council leader Cllr Dan Thomas (Conservative, Finchley Church End) said: “Cllr Zinkin is right – the opposition budgets are fantasy budgets.

“Residents are not going to vote for such a large increase in council tax – we all know that.”

Cllr Thomas added that Labour’s savings proposals “won’t work, and they don’t tally with Labour’s ambitions to bring everything in-house. How can you bring everything in-house if there are no senior officers, or very few, to run those services?”

At the end of the debate, the Labour and Liberal Democrat budgets were voted down and the Conservative administration’s budget was approved.