OXFORD City Council is poor value for money, according to public spending watchdog the Audit Commission.

The Oxford Times has obtained a copy of district auditor Andy Burn's annual assessment on the state of the Town Hall.

The draft report, which was finished in March this year, is a broad assessment of what kind of service the council was providing to the public in 2004/05.

Publication of the report had been postponed until after the city council elections on May 4 because the authority is appealing against some of its judgements.

However, in his report Mr Burns said of the council: "It has made gradual, but not significant overall improvements, and thus needs to demonstrate it can achieve substantially better services.

"Its overall value for money is poor."

He has criticised the minority Labour-run council for the way it makes use of its resources, but praised the authority for taking a "positive and constructive" approach to the audit, strengthening its finances and having "satisfactory" arrangements to prevent and detect fraud.

Mr Burns said the Town Hall had learned lessons from its part in the Cornmarket Street repaving fiasco and put systems in place to ensure better monitoring of large financial transactions, something for which the authority was criticised last year.

But he added: "The council is not able to demonstrate clear progress against its agreed priorities, such that it can be clear that its resources are targeted and being used effectively to deliver agreed service improvements and other benefits to local residents.

"In 2006, we concluded the council's value for money is poor with considerable room for improvement.

"Costs are high across a range of services, in some cases exceptionally so, for average outcomes."

Labour city council leader Alex Hollingsworth agreed to speak to The Oxford Times about the leaked report.

He said: "There is 80 per cent good stuff and 20 per cent bad. There are some quite legitimate criticisms that I would not dispute, but I dispute the technical judgements behind some of the key statements. What we do not dispute is there are bits of the council that are not as good as they ought to be."

Liberal Democrat group leader John Goddard said: "To delay by a procedural tactic the publication of bad news until after the city elections is contrary to the standards of honesty and transparency to which the electors are entitled."

Mr Hollingsworth said its publication was not delayed for political reasons.

Caroline Bull, chief executive of Oxford City Council, said: "The council has an early draft of the report which is over a month old. This is under review by the Audit Commission. Until the final report is issued we will not be commenting further."