Croydon Council's budget of £22million in cuts and efficiencies was passed at a council meeting last night.

There was a ray of hope for the 20,000 book worms who campaigned passionately for their libraries to remain open as Councillor Sara Bashford announced the six libraries under threat would remain as they are until July while the council looks at ways to keep them open.

It is understood the options being considered include moving some to other buildings and getting volunteers more involved in the running of the libraries.

Coun Bashford said 20,000 people took part in the consultation.

“This is real community involvement. All those who took part felt passionate about their local libraries.

“All six of those listed in the consultation will stay as they are. This is not a decision to rush.”

Coun Bashford said the council would take their time to consider ways of saving the libraries and unveil their plans at a council meeting in July.

Councillors moved on to debate the budget but had to adjourn the meeting for 45 minutes while the council's lawyers considered a legal loophole which would make the budget unconstitutional.

Tony Newman, leader of the opposition group, argued the budget had not been published on time and demanded council lawyers look at the constitution to make sure the proper procedure had been followed.

However, after the long recess Julie Belvir, the council solicitor, concluded that the budget was not unconstitutional.

Labour proposed an alternative budget which included plans to transfer £1,268,000 from the reserves, scrap Your Croydon and delay plans to collect food waste to help keep voluntary organisations going and save youth clubs from the axe.

They also pledged to freeze council tax this year but proposed an increase of 1.3 per cent in the next tax year equating to 29p a week.

Council Leader Mike Fisher said Labour had accepted 99.3 per cent of the Conservative budget in coming up with an alternative.

It includes plans to cut 310 council jobs through voluntary and compulsory redundancies and decrease the street cleaning budget by £700,000.

The council has already given the green light for cuts of £1.35m to the youth service as well as savings of £1.35m for axing the arts services and there have been cuts of up to £1m to the voluntary sector. And £1.2m has been axed from Sure Start funding by central Government.

Conservative Councillors clapped as the budget was passed by 36 votes to 32.