CRAVEN is being asked to put £10,000 towards a shortfall in Welcome to Yorkshire funding.

The district council is under pressure to help plug the shortfall in North Yorkshire County Council's contribution to the tourism agency to fund events across the whole district over the next two years.

But before it agrees, councillors have called for a full explanation at its next decision-making policy committee.

They had been put under pressure to agree to the money being handed over without any discussion.

But Cllr Simon Myers (Cons) said the council had a duty to residents to explore what was being asked of it and not to simply agree - even though the money was there and added that the issue had not even been on the agenda.

"It is very unfortunate that we are being asked for money in this way. In principle, I am in favour of supporting Welcome to Yorkshire, but we have a duty to the public and to be asked to give away £10,000 on that basis is not good enough.

"I would not do my business like that, and I don't think the public would appreciate it. We have £10,000 and I am happy for Welcome to Yorkshire to have it, but we need to do it properly."

Earlier in the meeting, Cllr David Ireton had asked whether Craven was being asked for any more money to pay for the staging of last year's Tour de France and was told by chief executive Paul Shevlin that it had was not being asked for a direct contribution to the TdF, but for an "additional contribution" to fund events for 2015-16.

Mr Shevlin, who offered councillors the opportunity of accepting the chief executive of Welcome to Yorkshire, Sir Gary Verity, to the next meeting, but was turned down, stressed it was "nothing to do with the cycle race".

Council leader Cllr Richard Foster (Cons) said the £10,000 would be a good investment to help fund a body which Craven could not hope to match in terms of tourism.

A spokesman for North Yorkshire County Council said: "Six councils in North Yorkshire have combined to form a business rate pool, an element of which is top-sliced to fund economic development projects.

"The county council, along with Craven, Hambleton, Richmond, Scarborough and Ryedale district councils, have allocated this economic development fund of around £200,000 to Welcome to Yorkshire over the next two years, in addition to the usual local authority subscriptions.

"This will support the agency’s work going forward following additional expenditure incurred by the Tour de France."