Maximum rise in Herefordshire council tax expected

Herefordshire is set to again raise council tax by the maximum 5 per cent from April.

The county council says it is under extra cost pressures totalling around £26 million, due to the rise in National Insurance costs and minimum wage, increased demand for, and cost of, child and adult care, and inflation more generally.

It also must new reckon without the Rural Services Delivery Grant from the government, which helped meet the higher cost of providing services in a rural county and is worth £7million in the current financial year.

As a consequence, Herefordshire’s draft revenue budget for the year from April totals £232 million, up from £213 million this financial year, a 9 per cent rise.

However based on its spending the first half of the year, the council forecast in November that it would actually spend £223 million this year.

In the financial year ahead it plans to make £6.9million in “savings and mitigations across council services”, the council said.

For a typical band D property in the county, the budget plan translates into a council tax bill of £1,969.36 for the year, an increase of £7.80 per month.

But the council says it does not plan to raise parking charges, another fund-raising lever available to it.

Two per cent of the increase is ring-fenced for adult care, while the remaining 2.99 per cent is the maximum the council can up the tax without a local referendum.

The draft revenue budget must first be passed by the council’s Cabinet on January 13 before being reviewed by scrutiny committees.

It will then come back to Cabinet on January 23 before getting a final sign-off from a full meeting of councillors on February 7.

Leader of Herefordshire Council’s minority Conservative administration Coun Jonathan Lester said the decision to propose the maximum council tax increase “has been a very difficult one”, but that the council’s service costs “need to be met and funded”.

“In the context of these pressures the only alternative would have been to cut services,” he said.

He added: “We will continue to campaign hard for the government to rethink its decision to get rid of the rural services grant.”