Council are the victims here. They are forced to debase themselves because central government, in the Tory era since 2010, simply offloads competencies to local authorities, without allocating extra funds or even slashing existing ones. So the priority has become to keep the lights on and find every way possible to monetize anything remotely monetizable, from parking to this (as well as cutting tons of jobs, closing libraries and so on). Councils are literally going bankrupt, but voters can’t make the link and keep voting for “low taxes” in Westminster and “the Council should do everything” at home, then complain when pigs can’t manage to lift off and fly.
That kind of fiscal « downloading » is also a way to keep wealth within your council, and poor areas can just get bent because they’ll have more needs, but the least ability to get revenue.
(If council’s primary revenue source is council tax within their own council).
That would be nice... but councils can only increase tax by <2% per year, and most of their revenue comes from a 'grant' by central government, which has been cut ~40% in the last decade.
Yep - "egoistic firewalling" is basically how Tory HQ sold the strategy to the local authorities they controlled (peppered with rebalancing some formulas so that they would get more than in the past, taken from more deprived areas they didn't control); then turned around and slashed so hard, the first towns to declare bankruptcy were their own [1][2][3]. And what do they do in London? Blame councils, of course! [4]
> but councils can only increase tax by <2% per year
The current cap is 2.99% and the 2020-21 plans are for 3.99%, which is split between the core principle and the adult social care principle. It is unlikely that many councils will increase it by less than the fully-permitted amount.
Also council tax increases in the recent past have capped at 5.99% some year~s and many actual increases were between 4.5% and 5.5%.
My council (in the North) already announced they will not ask for the full rise, but something like 1%. That's because they are well aware of the recent trend and they know the local population is feeling the heat.
I expect more will follow, because their seat is on the line - so few people vote in local elections, that minimal aggravation can quickly escalate into major upturns. They'll just cut more and more until there is nothing left.
> My council (in the North) already announced they will not ask for the full rise, but something like 1%.
That's fascinating - I'm genuinely intrigued where. Are you sure it's 1% total, not 1% of a sub part?
But one council doesn't disprove what I said (it was more of an opinion to be honest though). The first 10 search results I found were all 2-3.99%. I did say the "full amount" though - I'll knock that down to at "at least 3%".
The tax burden is high. They could certainly do with reducing it in my personal opinion.
A leaflet comes through the door every year or so telling me how much they spend in the local council. Usually the highest amount is not on schools, not on libraries, not on health, not on sweeping the streets or maintaining parks and playgrounds etc, but on "adult social care" (1) which as far as I know is a euphemism for benefits handouts for the baby-boomer generation.
It feels to me like an unrealistic burden is being placed on the current working generation to gold-plate the retirements of the current pensioners (because they tend to vote a lot), who frankly have got it pretty fucking good (not just free university education, but they got grants (i.e. free money), were able to purchase cheap and decent quality housing at relatively low salary multiples (e.g. detached 4 bed in nice areas for 3x average salary in the 60s & 70s), excellent pensions (often from the public sector), free travel, free tv licenses, jumping to the front of the queue in the NHS, free money for heating their homes etc etc, the pension triple-lock of a guaranteed 2.5% increase at a minimum etc, when working age people are lucky to get anything in their gig/zero-hours contract etc).
There has been talk of inter-generationalfairness a bit (at least before brexit took over). I hope something is done. </bitter>
My father's cousin has been living in social care for the last few years. He was put into a home associated with the council, but as he owned a home (that he'd lived in his whole life) he was forced to sell it to pay for his care. He is able to do most things by himself, but just needs someone to provide a bit of mental support - basically a friend. My father is his closest relative, but lives on the other side of the country.
Currently he pays ~£800 per week, which when the house was sold was backdated to pay for all the care he received. The thing is though that is just the care, the private landlord of the home has now decided he needs to pay another £700 per week for rent. The home is rather run down and he only has a tiny bedroom for himself (the bathroom is shared). As I understand the company providing the care is a private for-profit company too.
I'm not really surprised most council taxes is spent on social care if this is how much private companies are charging them.
