Taxpayers want managers in the NHS and quangos to be cut ahead of town halls, according to a Local Government Association survey.

The opinion poll by ComRes shows areas of public spending people think should be protected, those they think should be cut, and who they want to decide on cuts to local services.

It claims that 62% of people want councillors to make decisions about public spending in their local area, compared with 18% who backed MPs and two per cent who said officials in quangos.

Sixty-nine per cent of respondents said that NHS managers should be cut to save public money, while 57% said quangos should be first for the axe.

Only one per cent who responded regarded quangos as a frontline public service.

Dame Margaret Eaton, chair of the Local Government Association, said: “These figures are a vote of confidence in town halls. “People trust their local councillors to make tough decisions about spending in their area more than they trust national politicians.

“Councils are in the vanguard of reforming the public sector and will work with the Government to ensure that savings will be made by pruning out the maze of quangos, middlemen, bureaucratic funding streams and audit arrangements, rather than salami slicing services that the most vulnerable people depend on.”

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