Opposition parties on Warwickshire County Council put forward amendments to the Conservative budget, choosing to focus on different areas to invest and with one calling for a higher council tax increase.

Sarah Feeney, deputy leader of the Labour group, proposed a 4.64 per cent increase during this week's full council meeting.

She said: "We generally believe that all individuals have the right to live safely, healthily, happily and independently with the right support – but that support isn't without a cost. 

"We know our communities will face some unprecedented challenges in the next year, much as they have done in the last few months, but whenever there is challenge, there is greater call for us, greater need for our services and a greater need for us to try and level as much as we can the disparities in our society."

The headline addition in the proposed Labour budget was to invest £1.4 million to support the first 1001 days of a child's life – providing more support for struggling families with both parenting support and mental health support in early years.

Liberal Democrat leader Jerry Roodhouse explained that his party's budget would include extra money for the county's outdoor education policy while proposing the same 3.94 per cent council tax increase.

He said: "There was something called Marle Hall, the outdoor education centre, which disappeared. There was some money put into that and what we have sought to do is to mainstream that funding going forward because we feel it is the right thing to do if we want the best outdoor education for young people across the whole of Warwickshire."

Other proposals included further investment in the council's forestry team to meet the increase in demand and provide resilience to support emerging climate change initiatives, and direct more money into community transport to support the introduction and development of school travel plans.

Cllr Jonathan Chilvers, said his group would also raise council tax by 3.49 per cent and added it would tackle two main challenges faced by Warwickshire's residents – skills shortages and inflation driven by higher energy bills. 

He said: "Central government has not so much fallen asleep at the wheel, but has chosen to depart the driving seat altogether and has failed in its basic duties to provide stability and responsibly plan for the future. The Green budget focuses on investment in skills and lowering energy bills. It's backed up by additional investments in our youth services and for the fire service citizenship project.

"There are huge opportunities for Warwickshire to become a hub of new skills, creating high quality jobs that in time can have a significant positive impact on the energy bills that our councils, schools, communities and residents face."