Liberal Democrat councillors in Powys have told conservatives to 'stop throwing mud' as a row over budget cuts to Powys County Council rumbled on this week.

After the release of the local government settlement earlier this month which saw a 1% cut for Powys, Brecon and Radnorshire MP Chris Davies accused Ms Williams of "propping up" the government before accusing her of failing to stand up for her constituency.

He said last week: "She should be using her position as a member of the Welsh Government to stand up for Powys. All I can see her doing is propping up a Welsh Labour Government in Cardiff Bay which is holding our country back."

But Cllr James Gibson-Watt, leader of the LibDem-Green opposition group in Powys County Council, says the criticism is unfair, and that the blame for ongoing austerity measures lies with the UK Government in Westminster.

"These politicians know full well that funding for local government in Wales is governed by a formula previously agreed to by all the local authorities; and they should also remember that it was Kirsty Williams who negotiated with the Welsh Government to create a ‘funding floor’ for Welsh local authorities, which limits the level of any cuts. This means that Powys County Council will receive nearly £1 million more next than it would otherwise have received via the funding formula," he said.

"It is also a bit rich for Conservative politicians to complain about local government funding in Wales when their colleagues in the UK Conservative Government continue to make savage cutbacks to local government in England. They know that this has an equivalent adverse impact on the Barnett formula that determines the funding the UK Government gives to the Welsh Government. 

"The Tories should stop throwing mud and stop the austerity".

In a response, Chris Davies accused the Liberal Democrats of 'blatant opportunism' and said the austerity cuts were originally introduced by a Lib-Dem/Conservative coalition government in Westminster.

"With hundreds of millions of pounds more arriving to the Welsh Government from Westminster, there was the ideal opportunity for the Welsh Government to stop cuts to council budgets and increase the NHS budget. Sadly this did not happen, the Welsh Labour Government propped up by the Lib Dem’s sole AM made the decision to cut Powys budget," he said.

"The country was in an extremely worrying financial position and money had to be saved to stabilise the economy. I stand by many of the decisions made by the UK Government at the time, which the Liberals signed up to. Now they are trying to worm their way out of any responsibility for the decisions they made. 

"Just what do the Liberal Democrats even stand for now? All they seem to do is oppose everything. Opposing Brexit, and now opposing the austerity that they helped implement. People will see through their opportunism. "