The new leader of Herefordshire Council will be nominated at a meeting tomorrow (Thursday May 9th) and will be faced with the storm of protest resulting from the Council's latest round of proposed cuts.

Last week, Councillor John Jarvis announced his intention to resign as leader, when the council has its next full meeting, due to "medical reasons". In line with the council's constitution, the leading group, currently the Conservatives, will nominate a new leader at their AGM and then at the meeting of Full Council, on May 24th, the new leader will be elected.

The new leader has the unenviable task of dealing with the fall out of a further £9million in cuts due to be considered following Council chief executive Alistair Neill's re-appraisal of the 2013/14 Council budget, which had only been passed in February.In a letter to Council staff, last week, Alistair Neill described "weaknesses" in the budget which would result in 200 job losses over the next two years, in addition to the 100-120 planned for this year.

For the full story please see this week's Ross Gazette.