Cuts to crucial social sevices have been halted after councillors voted to raise council tax bills by 7.2 per cent.

Oxfordshire's Liberal Democrats agreed the increase with Labour backing at yesterday's county council meeting.

Finance bosses had advised councillors to consider an increase of between 6.8 and 7.2 per cent.

An increase of 7.2 per cent on last year's bills will mean a resident in a Band D property paying £699 instead of £652 - a rise of £47 a year.

District and parish councils and the Thames Valley Police Authority are still to add their figures to the final bill.

Liberal Democrat leader Margaret Godden said the decision would "stop the rot" of finance-driven cuts to social services.

Councillors were being asked to find a further £1.8m worth of cuts on top of about 8m of cuts imposed over three years.

That policy has now been reversed and social services spending will now increase by £1.7m.

Mrs Godden said: "We have lost 67 children's social workers in the past seven years.

"We didn't want a situation like the one in Haringey where a young girl died because a social worker was faced with too heavy a caseload.

"We will now be able to allocate more social workers to work with children in care. A social work team will also be set up at the John Radcliffe Hospital to deal with referrals from cases where children have suffered 'non-accidental' injuries."

Highways maintenance will also increase by £300,000 and there will be more money spent on extending library opening hours.

Education spending will remain in line with the Government's spending assessment, with special help for sixth forms.

Labour group leader Brian Hodgson said the increase was moderate and would mean more help for children and families.

Tory group leader Keith Mitchell called for a special debate on asylum-seekers, saying the problem of housing them was placing a financial burden on other services.