A WARNING has been sounded that frontline council services in Wrexham could be shut down as the local authority expects to receive less funding than anticipated from central government.

Wrexham Council previously revealed it was facing a budget blackhole of almost £10 million  over the next two years.

However, senior figures said the financial outlook had become worse during August amid the UK’s impending departure from the EU and the uncertainty caused by the possibility of a general election.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has also detailed his spending priorities after taking up office, with policing, healthcare and education likely to be the main focus.

Council leader Mark Pritchard said it meant there was a danger local authorities could miss out, resulting in job losses and a significant impact on the Wrexham area.

The independent politician said: “The frankness of it is that if we don’t have a fair settlement it will be a disaster for Wrexham and all authorities across North Wales.

“It won’t be just that we start trimming services, we will have to have the discussions, and we are having discussions on what services we stop.

“Obviously there will be an impact from that, and it will be on staff.

“I don’t want to go into it in great detail at this moment in time, but everybody across the country is looking at the settlement and if we don’t have a fair settlement it will have massive implications on services and staff across Wales.”

The council has written to both the UK and Welsh Governments to warn of the implications if it does not receive enough money to bolster spending on areas such as social care.

It has also asked for any announcements which have funding implications for authorities, including teacher pay rises, to be funded by government in full.

Chief executive Ian Bancroft said there was a risk some public bodies in Wales could collapse because of funding pressures.

He said: “The real worry for us is we are past the tipping point.

“If the settlement is worse than we were anticipating before the summer that means we have to go potentially further in areas that we would not want to and are unpalatable.

“The real concern is that funding needs to be thought about in terms of basic frontline services that have a real impact on people’s lives.

“If they’re not funded, we will see what’s happened in England in terms of financial failure of local authorities or service failure.”

Cllr Pritchard said he didn’t want to impose a high council tax increase on ratepayers in Wrexham to bridge the gap.

However, he admitted it was a position his administration would need to keep under review.

He added: “What we’ve done in the past is demonstrated we are a considerate authority and we’ve always set the council tax as fairly as we can.

“I think the dilemma we have this time is that it’s out of our control and we haven’t got the money to deliver services.”