COUNCIL TAX 'REBELS'

FIRST PUBLISHED BY: LOCAL GOVERNMENT CHRONICLE

KEEP TRACK OF WHICH COUNCILS HAVE REJECTED THE GOVERNMENT’S FINANCIAL INCENTIVE TO FREEZE COUNCIL TAX NEXT YEAR

Brighton & Hove City Council, the country’s first council to be run by the Green party, were the first to announce they would reject the governments’ funding for a Council Tax freeze and instead ask residents for 3.5% more next year.

Ever since the chancellor announced last Autumn that there would be funding for a second Council Tax freeze there have been mutterings about the financial pitfalls of the deal.

Instead of the four years of funding offered in 2011, and which was snapped up by every council in the land, this year’s offer is for one year only, leaving councils quickly facing a financial cliff edge which will have to be smoothed by spending cuts/savings or an even larger Council Tax increase in 2013-14.

Sensing this disquiet, LGC surveyed councils and found that as many as one in five were seriously considering turning down the financial incentive. Soon after our survey, it emerged that Teeside leaders had been discussing the issue and in a united front, bar Hartlepool BC, four of them announced they would increase Council Tax by 3.5%

Nottingham and Leicester City Councils weren’t far behind, and since then we’ve also heard from Gedling BC and Stoke-on-Trent City Council.  So far, all likely suspects as councils run by national opposition parties, but would any Conservative and Liberal Democrat councils take a stand and turn down their government’s not very enticing one-year offer?

Interestingly all the Tory councils declared so far have kept their increase below 3% while the Labour and Green councils have opted for as large an increase as they can get without triggering a referendum.

More councils - of all colours - are expected to announce increases in the weeks before budgets must be set, so it will be interesting to see whether any Tory council breaches the 3% mark. 

READ WHAT: ERIC PICKLES ‘SECRETARY OF STATE’ SAYS ABOUT OVER-CHARGED COUNCIL TAX.

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