Nottinghamshire County Council to publish £500 spends

All spends over £500 are to be published online by Nottinghamshire County Council to let residents see how their taxes are being spent.

The move comes as the Conservative-led authority looks to save £150m over the next three years.

Spends over £500 from November 2010 will be published from New Year's Day, with December's amounts published in February 2011 and so on.

Councillor Reg Adair said people ought to know how their money is spent.

'Significant savings'

"Local authority spend has been shrouded in secrecy for too long and publishing our spend will allow the taxpayer to hold us to account by seeing where their money goes," said Mr Adair, the county council's cabinet member for finance and property.

"We have already saved £8m since April thanks to improving our buying practices for goods and services.

"There is no sense in wasting money when we can sharpen up our buying practices to make significant savings for the benefit of the taxpayer," he added.

The council has to shed 3,000 posts in order to meet its savings targets.

The local authority currently employs around 12,000 staff.