One-off charge to turn overnight lights back on in Lincolnshire

Lincolnshire County Council switched off more than half of the region's street lights in 2016 for part of the night in a bid to save money

Plans to give communities the power to turn their street lights back on have been approved - at a "one-off" cost of up to £300 per light.

Lincolnshire County Council switched off more than half of the region's 68,000 street lights in 2016 for part of the night in a bid to save money.

The move was criticised and led the authority to review its policy.

Officials have now backed a scheme to allow parish councils to pay for lights to be re-instated overnight.

Under the scheme, parish councils, or equivalent, would have to pay £300 per light, or £150 per light if within existing council works.

Lights would also have to be switched on along entire roads, not just individually, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

The amount has been calculated to cover the cost of both converting lights to LED, and, if already converted, the cost of the energy required to run them for the next 20 years, scrutiny committee members said.

Chairman Mike Brookes said: "Those costs are ours and so those are the charges we have to make to be fair to everybody else who keeps their part-night lighting as it is."

He added it was for individual communities to make a decision "how big their need is and whether that is value for money".

Under the current system, some street lights are turned off between midnight (10pm in some areas) and dawn.