ANY tax increases coming from a proposal to combine several local councils will be in the 'interest of fairness' say councillors, who have dismissed claims of extortionate rises.

Bridport Town Council has published three options for the future governance of the town, with the preferred proposal being a merger of four parishes and the town council into a single council for the built area of the town, with an aim of improving local democracy and services.

The proposal includes the merging of the existing parishes of Allington, Bothenhampton and Walditch, Bradpole, the Vearse Farm development and Bridport into a single council area. The proposal would see the parish areas grouped into the same council tax bands as the Bridport area.

This has led to fears of large council tax increases. Town councillors played down these fears at a council meeting on Tuesday, stating any increases would be minor and the standardising of council tax prices would be 'fairer' as everyone would pay the same amount for the services used by everyone.

Jim Basker, chairman of Bothenhampton and Walditch Parish Council, had claimed the parishes would be 'under threat' if the proposal was 'rushed through'. He asked how the town council could justify the changing the amount of councillors from 44 to 20 and said ward committees which would be set up for outlying areas would have no power.

He said: "The great thing about a parish council is the members are given much better contact with Dorset Council and other organisations which can directly affect their particular parish. This loss of local effect is really rather sad in a time where everything is centralised and local identities tend to be forgotten about."

Town clerk Will Austin said committees can be given responsibility for making decisions on behalf of Bridport Town Council, and can also be allocated a budget which they have full control over.

Cllr Julian Jones added that the reduction of councillors would be a 'significant enhancement of democracy' as many of the parishes have not had any elections and under the new system 'it is very likely that all the wards will be contested'.

Cllr Dave Rickard, leader of Bridport Town Council, emphasised that whilst a decision is expected to be made within the next seven months, no changes will come into place until 2024, so there is plenty of time to 'fine tune the ideas'.

Cllr Rickard said: "We have every intention of having further talks with each of the parish councils and communications are ongoing with Dorset Council to get questions answered on the complexities of the situation.

"There is still plenty of time to make decisions, as long as we identify the direction we want to go in, we have more than two years to fine tune these ideas and so people should not worry that this idea is being rushed through."

Town councillors concluded the discussion with a unanimous vote in favour of the proposal.