FEARS that Bolton Council could lose millions in funding have been rejected by local leaders.

Figures suggesting that Bolton Council could lose as much as £6.6million in the government's upcoming 'Fair Funding Review'.

The analysis comes from the Labour camp within the Conservative-controlled Local Government Association.

Under a review of the local authority funding formula, the group has predicted that areas worst affected will be those in the north which turned Conservative for the first time in decades after the December election.

Local Labour group head Linda Thomas wrote to Bolton North East MP Mark Logan, saying: "The figures expose the fair Funding Review for what it really is: just another Conservative plan to take hundreds of millions from deprived communities and funnel it towards leafy Tory shires."

But Conservative council leaders are now hitting out at the figures, calling them 'fake news'.

Bolton Council leader David Greenhalgh received a response from the Secretary of State directly, saying: “This is an analysis prepared by the Labour Party and issued by the Labour group on the LGA.

"It is purely speculative as we haven’t published or even consulted on our formula yet — and designed to undermine the case of fair funding.”

Cllr Greenhalgh said: “This is misleading, inaccurate and Labour scaremongering at its worst. These figures are produced by the internal Labour Party with no other purpose than to politically undermine.

"We know the kind of outdated formulas Labour locally used to work out funding, and this is yet another example of Labour nationally making judgement on a set of criteria that Government itself hasn’t even set yet. It’s what gives politics a bad name.”