Council Tax is set to rise across England and Wales to cover funding shortfalls, but there is some good news too.
A whopping 94% of councils across England and Wales believe they will put up Council Tax to cover rising costs, according to a new survey.
Nearly all of the councils who took part in the research would increase the tax by more than 1.5%, and some households could see increases as high as 5%.
The research from the Local Government Information Unit (LGiU) and the Municipal Journal (MJ) surveyed chief executives, council leaders, directors of finance and cabinet members for finance across 131 Councils in England and Wales.
Coming up short
Worryingly, the survey revealed that 10% of council decision-makers say that they don’t have the budget to meet their legal obligations this year, while 42% said they expected to impose cuts that would be noticeable to residents.
Nine out of 10 councils said it was a high priority or essential to look at other sources of income. Nearly 90% say they will have to increase charging for services while a further 82% say they will be forced to dip into reserves to gather necessary funding.
There’s already been talk of raising Council Tax to cover the ever-increasing cost of social care, but survey results reveal 90% believe that charging more for Council Tax isn’t a viable way to plug the gap in funding.
This is alarming as over half of councils (55%) said that adult social care was their greatest immediate pressure.
Jonathan Carr-West, chief executive of LGiU, said: “The Government has shown a genuine and radical commitment to changing the way Britain is governed.
“The system we have now is one which no one would design. Central Government and local authorities both want to see a sustainable independent funding model. But until we answer fundamental questions about how to make this work, devolution will be a process rather than a revolution.”
What's the good news?
Some councils have ditched proposed price rises that would have forced them to take a public vote. Residents in Surrey were relieved to hear that a jaw-dropping 15% rise has been scrapped by the local council in favour of a 4.99% rise.
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