Forum Topic

Council tax cut ?

L.B.H. announced today a council tax cut of 1/2% (yes a half%), that equates to under £500,000. When you consider that the Leader of the Council & the Cheif Exec have a slush fund of £3.6 million I find it an insult that they think they are doing the vulnerable a favour

Bradley Fisher ● 4574d8 Comments

Actually I was being a bit sarky - it is pretty well-known local elections are held every four years and have been for donkey's years, but I would rather they didn't bother with this pathetic gesture and kept as many of our services going as possible. I'd have more time for them if they'd considered that, found some guts and backbone, and put the tax up to improve things

Vanessa Smith ● 4574d

I agree its a strange decision and if it was a manifesto pledge it was a mistake. From memory central government are incentivizing LA's to freeze or cut council tax so it might bring additional resources in. It would be nice if this was explained, I must read the press release.....

Iain Muir ● 4574d

I don't know whether you were being ironic Vanessa but of course the timing of this is to do with the approach of the local elections.  Nonetheless they said they would cut Council Tax and they have honoured the pledge, for which they deserve due credit.On the political front this should see off any lingering threat from the Tories, for whom low Council Tax has been very much the be all and end all of their local agenda.  If Council Tax is all that it's about and Labour can do it too then what is there to be voting Conservative for?Of course the triumphant press release that features on the news page of this site only tells us what the administration will not be cutting.  As a rule of thumb it would be safe to consider what isn't mentioned in the release and to assume that that is where the cuts will be.

Phil Andrews ● 4574d

Well, there ia an election every four years - no change there -  May 2014 to be precise, I doubt this has anything much to do with that. But although the saving to most of us is negligible, as a whole I would think they mount up to a fair amount for services under threat, and that's where I think it should be spent. Ditto dopey Boris and his pennies, I'd rather fire services and police were funded.

Vanessa Smith ● 4574d

There must be an election approaching.What is the point of cutting when all the time we hear of cuts and excuses for poor services 'due to cuts'They could leave it unchanged and maintain some services properly.Even in tough times for so many, they still play games with our money at Town Halls.

Anthony Waller ● 4574d

Us too John, after all the pittance that you 'save' is ridiculous, what planet are these people on if they think this will make the slightest difference to the average person?

Vanessa Smith ● 4574d

The fact remains that they said they would cut the council tax in their manifesto. Some challenged this at the time of the 2010 election. Now they can claim they delivered.More importantly, in my opinion, like the Tory/ICG coalition before them, the council tax pledge comes at the expense of services to the most vulnerable in our community. I would have been prepared to pay more council tax if it had reduced the scale of cuts to services to the elderly and disabled in the borough that have occurred every year since 2006.

John Connelly ● 4574d

Marvellous news.I think I'll go down the cafe and spend my years savings(£8.40)on a decent breakfast.This would be laughable if it were not such a lip service insult.How about keeping the money and putting it toward a subsidy of meals on wheels or the dial a ride service?After all they are supposed to be Labour,are they not? If they think they can buy my vote by doing this,they are having the proverbial laugh.

Keith Iddon ● 4574d