Category Archives: Council tax

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24 Nov 2016

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Accountability, Austerity cuts, Council tax, Devolution, Local Enterprise Partnership, Transparency

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Devolution: “flawed fiscal ‘power’, an unjust system, unfulfilled potential”

“… local authority funding (for services) will become far more volatile as year to year income will be intrinsically linked to those who pay rates locally and those who choose to appeal. So, in sum business rates devolution in its current guise is less about devolved power and more about the devolution of risk and the associated, potentially negative, effect on services. …

… In 2016, there is no such thing as the UK housing market, rather a polarised collection of divergent, individual markets (hyper-dynamic price inflation in London versus low demand and price stagnation in parts of Liverpool & East Lancashire, for example) bearing little or no resemblance to the situation at the time of the last revaluation some 25 years ago.
The effect of this is an increasingly unfair council tax banding where a resident in Blackpool in a Band A property currently pays 35% more in council tax than a resident in a Band A property in Kensington and Chelsea, where average gross earnings are more than double that of those living beside the Pleasure Beach. …

… So far, devolution has only served to deflect risk and responsibility for the local effect of national cuts and add a further layer of complexity to an already intractable local government governance system. The lack of real power in devolution deals to date does not fully equip places or the incoming City Mayors to effectively deal with the challenges of the modern economy whilst driving tax revenue.

Without true devolution of power, the potential contribution of local government towards a prosperous future for people and place is in danger of drowning in a mire of unnecessary fiscal constraints and excessive levels of localised risk.”

http://www.cles.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/CLES-Think_Devolution-Beyond-the-rhetoric_Nov-2016.pdf

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5 Nov 2016

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Accountability, Audit (EDDC), Austerity cuts, Council tax, Developers/ Development, Greater Exeter, Planning System, Sidmouth/ Sidford/ Sidbury, Sustainability, Transparency

Black holes and green fields

Comment reproduced from post below:

The leaderships approach to finances over the last decade or more has been driven by a single-minded dogma to avoid any rise in council tax, even to match inflation. They have achieved this by relying not only on the government’s normal grant, but also on the government’s New Homes Bribe (ooops, Bonus – which gives payments for 6 years for each house built) which in turn has driven the mind-boggling growth numbers in the East Devon Local Plan which could easily see overall growth of more than 35% – YES THAT IS NOT A TYPO, I DO MEAN GROWTH OF HOMES OF MORE THAN A THIRD – over the period of the current Local Plan.

(Imagine all the buildings in East Devon – in Exmouth, Budleigh, Sidmouth, Seaton, Axminster, Honiton, etc. etc. – all lumped together – that’s a lot of land built on. Now take a third of that huge area, and imagine all the green fields in East Devon that will need to be built upon to make that happen, a lot of which will be in our AONBs. That is the EDDC Conservative vision for East Devon.)

Anyway, back to the finances. So EDDC’s future financial plans were predicated on large income from the New Homes Bonus. But George Osborne introduced an austerity regime which decided to abolish not only the normal grant but also the New Homes Bonus, so now the EDDC’s finances have a huge hole in them (made worse of course by the vanity projects they are undertaking like the no-longer-cost-neutral move from the Knowle).

And that is why we have seen a 4% increase in Council tax this year, and likely to see further increases in council tax way above inflation in the next few years.

Fortunately (????!!!!!), the government has thrown EDDC a lifeline by deciding to allow councils to keep all the local business rates as revenue – so we are now seeing EDDC allowing dubious business developments approved (like the recent Greendale application – submitted by a generous donor to the local Conservatives) and we should expect this to ramp up as the cash flow from the New Homes Bonus runs down.

Now back to the mental picture of 1/3 growth in homes – take the amount of land you have pictured for new homes, and add to it a significant growth in industrial buildings (like Sidford and Greendale). Terrifying isn’t it.

Of course, if you take have been watching EDDC’s actions, you will know that they have already rationalised this by joining (without any consultation with the public or indeed councillors) with Exeter City Council and Teignbridge District Council to form so called Greater Exeter. Think of Greater London and Greater Manchester and you will get the picture – huge sprawling joined up conurbations, with extensive suburbs to feed the businesses in the city centre. We are already seeing assaults on the green wedges that separate our towns and villages – so this is not as far from reality as you might think.

So there you have it. A double whammy – huge increases in Council Tax whilst rampant developments start to cover our beautiful countryside and Exeter grows exponentially in order to meet the huge Local Plan targets for new homes.

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15 Jul 2016

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Affordable and Social Housing, Council tax, Developers/ Development, Land banking

Charge council tax on unbuilt homes says Lords Committee

“The [House of Lords] Economic Affairs Committee in its report “Building more homes” has strongly recommended that the Government must lift its target by 50% and build 300,000 homes each year to tackle the housing crisis. It also suggests that Local authorities and housing associations must be freed to build substantial numbers of homes for rent and for sale.

Key findings

In their report, “Building more homes”, published today, the cross-party House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee criticises the Government’s housing policy for:

Setting a new homes target which will fail to meet the demand for new homes or moderate the rate of house price increases.

Restricting local authorities’ access to funding to build more social housing.

Creating uncertainty in the already dysfunctional housing market by frequent changes to tax rules and subsidies for house purchases, reductions in social rents, and the extension of the Right to Buy. All of these changes reduce the supply of homes for those who need low cost rental accommodation.
A narrow focus on home ownership which neglects those who rent their home.

Conclusions

The Committee makes wide-ranging recommendations to address the housing crisis, including:

Restraints on local authority borrowing should be lifted. Local authorities should be free to borrow to fund social housebuilding as they are other building programmes. This would enable local authorities to resume their historic role as one of the major builders of new homes, particularly social housing.

The current historically low cost of borrowing means local authorities could make a large contribution to building the houses we need for the future. Further, the new Prime Minister has announced that the Government will abandon their fiscal target. This paves the way to increase local authority borrowing powers.

Council tax should be charged on development that is not completed quickly. The Government’s reliance on private developers to meet its target of new homes is misguided. The private sector housebuilding market is oligopolistic with the eight largest builders building 50% of new homes. Their business model is to restrict the volume of housebuilding to maximise their profit margin. To address this the Committee recommend that local authorities are granted the power to levy council tax on developments that are not completed within a set time period.

Maximise the use of public land. The Government must take decisive steps to build on the very substantial holdings of surplus publicly owned land. The Committee recommends that a senior Cabinet minister must be given overall responsibility for identifying and coordinating the release of public land for housing, with a particular focus on providing low cost homes. The National Infrastructure Commission should oversee this process.

Local authorities should be given the power to increase planning fees. Local authorities should be able to set and vary planning fees to help fund a more efficient planning system and the upper cap on these charges should be much higher than the current limit. …”

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201617/ldselect/ldeconaf/20/20.pdf

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16 Jun 2016

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Accountability, Austerity cuts, Council tax

“Councils or company bosses, those in power have a duty of stewardship”

Letter in Guardian:

“Aditya Chakrabortty (Opinion, 14 June) compared my appearance before a Tottenham magistrate [for refusing to pay council tax in protest against cuts to social security] with Philip Green’s appearance before MPs. It is an apt comparison. In both cases the authorities failed to take steps to prevent the kind of disasters facing the pensioners of BHS or the benefit claimants of the London borough of Haringey.

In my case, I asked Grant Thornton, Haringey’s auditors, to take into account the damage done to the wellbeing of many benefit claimants by welfare “reform” when auditing the enforcement costs, now £115, added by the council to the council tax arrears of more than 20,000 households a year. It is a last straw that breaks many hearts already struggling with rent and utility arrears and benefit sanctions .

Grant Thornton replied: “We have no remit … to opine on the impact of this policy on the wellbeing of those required to pay council tax.” Why not? Why didn’t Haringey tell them that the Ministry of Justice and the Department for Communities and Local Government have issued guidance specifically drawing the attention of courts and councils to the vulnerable circumstances of residents. Or Lord Freud tell them that “Four principles have underpinned welfare reforms. First the welfare system should support the elderly, vulnerable and disabled people…”

Reverend Paul Nicolson
Taxpayers Against Poverty”

http://gu.com/p/4yenj

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20 Mar 2016

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Austerity cuts, Council tax, Education (local)

Apprentices will cost council tax payers extra money

“The Government’s apprenticeship drive will force councils to recruit thousands of trainees each year despite them having reduced their own staff numbers by 40% since 2010, councils leaders have warned.

All public sector organisations have been set an annual target of 2.3% of the workforce that should now be apprentices. The LGA is calling for an exemption from the obligation and stressed that councils would have to create 33,000 apprenticeships each year and find an extra £400 million in salaries – the biggest contribution of any part of the public sector including the NHS.

The Association also said that finding money to pay the new apprenticeship level from April 2017 would cost councils £207 million a year and argued that money raised by the levy should be pooled locally to allow local areas to create apprenticeships to fill local skills gap and meet employers’ needs.”

Click to access the-knowledge-18-march-2016-issue-43.pdf

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19 Feb 2016

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Austerity cuts, Council tax, DCC

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DCC Deputy Leader moans about the effects of austerity – the platform he chose to stand on at recent elections!

Owl is having difficulty understanding why the Deputy Leader (Conservative) of Devon County Council is moaning about cuts in public services, since austerity was the platform he chose to stand on when he asked for public votes at a recent election.

What did he think was going to happen?

Those who didn’t vote for his party (the majority of voters in the country and in Devon (first past the post creates this) knew pretty much how things were going to pan out and are angry but not as surprised as Mr Clatworthy!

Here is his view:

“The funding of rural counties over urban areas has been condemned as unfair by the deputy leader of Devon County Council.

John Clatworthy, who is also the cabinet member for finance, said Devon’s budget would have been very different if the county was funded at the national average.

He said the government had recognised the disparity between rural and urban funding and granted Devon an extra £8.4m – the fourth highest in the country.

But overall Devon’s residents were still suffering from historic under-funding.

“I did not come into local government to see fewer resources to support our communities,” he said.

“On the contrary, we need the right level of financial support. Devon does not receive average funding and there is a clear disparity between urban and rural funding.”

Mr Clatworthy said, on average, rural areas received £130 per person less Government funding than urban areas.

Devon’s schools got £287 less per pupil than the national average. If Devon received the average it would mean an extra £25m for the county’s schools, he said.

In Public Health, Devon got £38 per person compared with an national average of £69 whilst the City of London received £200 per person. If Devon received the average it would mean an additional £22.4m.

When it comes to transport infrastructure, for every £100 spent in the South East we receive £7.50 in the South West,” said Mr Clatworthy.

“Because we are receiving less than the average funding, many authorities must be receiving well above the average.

“That cannot be right or equitable and needs to be addressed because the cuts are felt harder on authorities with less than average funding.”

Mr Clatworthy said that the Government’s austerity agenda meant that between 2010 and 2019, almost £250m would have been removed from Devon’s budget.

But, for 2016/17, the county council would still be spending £443.5m on services. After allowing for inflation and other spending pressures, that represented savings of £34.3m on the current year.

In spite of this, there would be an increase of £11.3m in the budget for children and £5m in the budget for adult care.

Mr Clatworthy said the council had decided to accept the Government’s offer of a two per cent increase in council tax to help fund adult social care.

The increase in the living wage would cost Devon over £7 million and the two per cent rise would bring in £6.5m.

“With reduced Government support, we need to have sufficient funds to deliver all our services so, reluctantly, we are having to add 1.99 per cent to the two per cent making a 3.99 per cent increase this year.

“This additional funding will give certainty of income which is essential to protect services.”

http://www.exeterexpressandecho.co.uk/Devon-s-historic-underfunding-highlighted-council/story-28769419-detail/story.html

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19 Feb 2016

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Asset sweating, Austerity cuts, Council tax

Transfer “assets” to town and parish councils, then threaten them if they put up their precepts to pay for them!

BOTH THESE STORIES ARE FROM THIS WEEK’S KNOWLEDGE E-NEWSLETTER PUBLISHED BY EDDC:

That’s what happens when you live in Eton La-La Land!

“Council finances are in a “mess” and the vast majority have said they will need to increase charges for services to make ends meet in the face of a government funding cut of 28%, a think-tank has said. As councils finalise their 2016/17 budgets, nearly 90% said they will have to increase charges,
according to a survey by the Local Government Information Unit. The think-tank also found that:

40% would need to cut frontline services that are “evident to the public”. Nine in 10 councils will raise council tax in the coming year, compared with half in 2015. In addition, 82% of councils said they will have to dip into reserves to balance the books, up from 55% in 2015. Jonathan Carr-West, Chief Executive of LGiU, said: “Local government finance is a mess. Our research shows that right now councils are cobbling together their finances by using reserves and increasing charging wherever they can.”

So, district councils are transferring “assets” that cost money to maintain to towns and parishes – toilets, halls, etc – but not assets that make them lots of money, such as car parks. To retain these services, towns and parishes have to increase precepts to pay for them.

BUT

HERE IS THE SECOND STORY:

“Parish councils wanting to raise council tax “excessively” may have to first consult the public in line with larger authorities, the Government has warned. Analysis by BBC News show 3,659 parish councils raised the basic Band D tax bill by more than 1.99%, the referendum threshold for larger councils. Sixty small authorities at least doubled residents’ bills last year. Another 130 put their bills up by between 50 and 99% while 1,001 increased the annual bill for a Band D home by £5 or more.

A Department for Communities and Local Government spokesman said: “Town and parish councils should protect their taxpayers from excessive council tax increases; if they fail to do so, government has the option of making them subject to the referendum principles in future.”

Click to access the-knowledge-19-february-2016-issue-39.pdf

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5 Feb 2016

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Council tax, EDDC, Stuart Hughes

Tax rebels! Today Councillor Claire Wright – yesterday Councillor Stuart Hughes!

Oh, how times change! Doubt as current Chair he will be toppling the party whip any time soon or dumping scrap metal in the council chamber in protest at taxes!

” … … Hughes and others formed the Raving Loony Green Giant Party. The party was much more organised and the inclusion of “Green” in the title also pointed to a party with at least some priorities. The Green Giants focused much more on local priorities and “serious” politics and were more democratic than the party they had left behind.

Hughes was a fierce local campaigner and in 1991 he did the unthinkable by taking on the local Tories who had a total monopoly in local government in Devon. He took a safe Tory seat on East Devon District Council and a seat on Sidmouth Town Council. Hughes refused to pay the Poll Tax and was hounded by local Tories for it.

Although technically he sat on the District Council and not the County Council (who actually collected the tax) they consistently goaded the unrepentant councillor. When legal action was threatened, Hughes responded by marching in to the council chambers and dumping scrap metal to the value of the unpaid tax. The voters clearly approved as Hughes was elected to the County Council himself toppling the Tory Whip in the process.

Loonies, Splitters & Monster Ravers

Thank goodness we have the calm and measured opposition of East Devon Alliance these days!

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27 Jan 2016

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Council tax, Police (local)

Devon and Cornwall Police ask for more money from council taxes

“Police in Devon and Cornwall hope to raise an extra £1.8 million from council taxpayers next year after a cut in their government grant.

Police and Crime Commissioner Tony Hogg is to ask homeowners in Devon and Cornwall to pay an extra 1.99 per cent on the slice of the tax which goes to support the police.

This amounts to an extra 6.5p a week for a typical Band D homeowner, or £3.37 a year.

Mr Hogg said the money was needed to ensure that policing resources can be maintained in the region.

He will ask his scrutiny body, the Police and Crime Panel, to agree the 1.99 per cent increase for 2016-17 when it meets next Friday. 5 February …”

http://www.westernmorningnews.co.uk/Police-ask-council-taxpayers-extra-1-8m/story-28617166-detail/story.html

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27 Jan 2016

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Council tax, Flooding

Councils to be allowed to charge extra council tax in flood-prone areas.

Councils will be allowed to charge an extra £15 per year for properties in flood-prone areas to fund flood defences.

Shouldn’t this be paid by the developers who did the building, or the councils themselves who approved it?

And what about areas that were NOT flood-prone until developers built other properties around them?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/flooding/12123738/Homeowners-living-in-flood-hit-areas-face-higher-council-tax-bills.html

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6 Jan 2016

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Council tax, DCC, EDDC

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EDDC and DCC raise council taxes

EDDC by 1.9%
DCC by 2.00%

and both slash services as government help dries up and more services are privatised. 2% is maximum allowed by central government before triggering a referendum.

Here is what Claire Wright thinks about the DCC rise:

http://www.claire-wright.org/index.php/post/devon_county_council_hikes_council_tax_by_two_per_cent_as_govt_slashes_budg