PETROL prices and the future of local authorities were on the agenda for a Conservative Party senior figure when she visited Kendal this week.

Caroline Spelman, the Tory Party local government spokesman, was in South Lakeland on the election trail, promoting the party's policies which she claimed would produce better performance in local government for local people.

Mrs Spelman said she recognised the importance of petrol prices for people in rural areas like South Lakeland. While stopping short of urging Chancellor Gordon Brown to reduce petrol taxes, she said that with 80 per cent of the price of fuel at the pumps coming from taxation, the Government could absorb some of the rise in world oil prices.

She said that the Conservatives were opposed to regional assemblies, and that her party would keep the existing local government structure but would try to give back to local authorities some of the power that she claimed had been taken from them to decide how to spend resources.

This would include trying to balance out the current way in which local government was funded, with 75 per cent of finances coming from central government, and 25 per cent being raised locally.

By doing this, it could go a long way to solving problems such as the recent controversy over funding for the county's police, she claimed. As previously reported, Cumbria Police Authority has been told it could have a maximum budget imposed for 2005/06 under capping powers after increasing its precept by 14.97 per cent.

"I think they (local authorities) are more likely to be able to put resources into what they think is important, having asked the public locally what is important," she said.