Payroll costs, including travel and subsistence, represent the biggest single expense for Kerry County Council, its 2016 budget meeting was told yesterday.

A majority of councillors in Kerry have voted to retain property tax rates at current levels, and not to adjust the basic rates, after being told there is no point in any modest increase.

Council chiefs have been urged to repurpose a “monumentally ugly” disused factory in a tourist town.

The dead are being laid to rest under footpaths in a Kerry cemetery.

Over €2m a year is being paid out each year as the result of compensation claims against local authorities in Kerry.

Councillors in Kerry have rejected a call by Sinn Féin to reduce next year’s property tax bill by the maximum 15% allowable following a plea by management that the council coffers would be under huge strain and services would have to be reduced.

Senior management on Kerry County Council is opposed to any reductions in the Local Property Tax, though the council has the power to reduce it.

Businesses in Kerry which can afford to pay their rates but are not doing so will be made pay up in 2014, county manager Tom Curran warned yesterday.

Kerry County Council is due to take in €2.5m next year in property taxes.