The ruling group on Bradford Council has come under fire - for saving cash.

Bradford's opposition Labour group has hit out at the Conservative-run authority, saying the £548,000 saved out of last year's budget could have made a difference to any number of projects, but particularly in youth services.

The cash has now been added to the Council's bank balance for next year, with the Conservatives stating the money had not and would not be wasted.

Labour group leader Councillor Ian Greenwood described the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats, who helped form the budget policy, as "risk-averse" and said they had let the authority down by not using the money.

Coun Greenwood said: "We believe this money should have been directed at the provision of services for young people designed to reduce anti-social behaviour. Some youth services were not invested in at all."

He said the leftover cash displayed the "incompetence of the political management in the financial affairs of this authority" and added: "They are risk- averse; they would go with the safe option without realising that can be a dangerous thing to do.

"We now have an organisation that is slowing down, which is not prepared to make the big decisions."

Kris Hopkins, Conservative deputy leader and the portfolio holder for corporate matters, said the money saved last year could not be moved once the budgets had been set.

He added: "We have spent over half a billion pounds so it is not a huge saving, but it has not been wasted. So rather than spend it on some headline area, like youth services, we want to sit down and make a sensible decision."

Leader of the Liberal Democrat group Councillor Jeanette Sunderland has also criticised the budgets of the Conservative group, with whom she worked closely until before the election.

"They are using this money as a windfall to bail out social services - we need a fundamental base budget review," she said.

Bradford's social services department spent £3.4 million more than it should have done during the year 2003-04. Most was spent on paying for children in its care to be looked after outside the authority's boundaries.

l Coun Greenwood again defended his party's decision to step down from the powerful executive committee and devote more effort to the authority's scrutiny committees.

He said: "The new structure will make it clear it is the Conservatives making the decisions. We will scrutinise every action the Conservatives take and the current structure will allow us to do that more effectively than the previous one."

His party is expected to demand more decisions be taken before the meetings of the full Council and not by the Conservative-run executive.