The Bradley Stoke Journal

Bradley Stoke Town Council has voted to freeze the precept charge on residents’ council tax bills for the second successive year. The decision, agreed at last Wednesday’s Full Council meeting, sees the charge on a Band D property remain at £113.50 for 2012/13.

Commenting on the freeze, Cllr Roger Avenin (Con, Baileys Court), Chair of the Finance Committee, said:

“We continue to find ourselves in uncertain economic times and many residents’ household budgets are under pressure. As a Council we’re here to support the community and it simply wouldn’t be right to ask hard working families to pay any more this year.”

Councillors are also keen to point out that services aren’t under threat with Town Mayor Cllr Ben Walker commenting:

“We’re not making cuts, we’re still providing for the community; we’re just focusing very hard on doing everything we can as efficiently as possible. Our youth budget for example has been maintained but it has been opened up to a wider variety of organisations than ever before, so we can support a diverse range of activities for young people of all ages.”

The Town Council precept typically represents less than 10% of the total Council Tax bill. The largest proportion, around 80%, is taken by South Gloucestershire Council (SGC), with the police and fire services making up the remainder.

More: Government offers SGC a sweetener to freeze Council Tax »

Discussion is open - 1 comment (view) - click here to respond.

Ratepayers in Bradley Stoke will see no increase in the amount of Council Tax they pay in 2011/2012 following decisions by all four charging bodies to freeze their respective tax demands at 2010/2011 levels.

South Gloucestershire Council (SGC), Avon and Somerset Police and Avon Fire & Rescue have all decided to set zero percent increases, thereby securing ‘Council Tax Freeze Grants’ from central government, worth £2.8m (equivalent to a 1.6% tax rise) to SGC alone.

Bradley Stoke Town Council (BSTC), which is not eligible for the government sweetener, has also declared an unchanged precept – leading to a unaltered total bill of £1,580 for the ‘average’ band D property in the town.

Opposition groups supported Conservative-led SGC’s tax freeze but were critical of the lack of detail on proposed cuts and the need to dip into the authority’s reserves.

In setting a budget of £196 million council, SGC says it will implement a set of initiatives to help it run more efficiently, which it hopes will save taxpayers just over £9 million during 2011/12.

The projected savings include £6.6 million through simplifying its ‘back office’ function (rising to around £10 million per year eventually); £1.2 million through reducing the number of senior managers working at the Council (rising to around £2 million eventually) and £1.4 million by procuring goods and services more efficiently (rising to between £7 million and £9 million eventually).

The efficiency savings will see more than 300 Council jobs axed over the next two years.

In addition to the projected savings, the Council will need to take £2.3 million from its reserves in order to balance the books.

The Town Council’s 2011/2012 budget also foresees a shortfall – of nearly £19k (equivalent to a 2.3% precept rise) but Councillors voted unanimously to set a zero percent precept rise and fund the defecit from reserves.

Read on to find out what local politicians had to say »

South Gloucestershire Council (SGC) has agreed a 2.5% rise in council tax for 2010/2011.

The increase, agreed at last Wednesday’s Full Council meeting, is well below the government’s favoured CPI (Consumer Prices Index) measure of inflation, which registered 3.5% in January. It is however higher than the expected average Council Tax increase for all English authorities, which has been estimated at 1.8% [source: CIPFA].

The Council’s budget includes an extra £2 million a year to improve the maintenance of roads, pavements and drains in the district. Savings will be made by reducing the Council’s workforce by 317 posts and introducing a new IT system to improve efficiency.

Elsewhere in the region, Bristol City Council and North Somerset Council have both agreed 2.0% rises.

Bradley Stoke Town Council has already decided to raise its precept by 1.8% for 2010/2011, following a year with no increase in 2009/2010.

The Avon & Somerset Police Authority will be raising its precept by an inflation-busting 4.2% in 2010/2011, blaming the increase on a shortfall in funding from central government.

Related link: Reactions to the South Gloucestershire Council budget and council tax announcement (SouthGlos Post)

South Gloucestershire Council (SGC) has agreed a 3.9% increase in council tax for 2009/2010, the second lowest in the Council’s short history.

The increase, agreed at yesterday’s Full Council meeting, once again exceeds the government’s favoured CPI (Consumer Prices Index) measure of inflation, which registered 3.0% in January.

By comparison, North Somerset Council looks set to agree an increase of 2.5% and Bristol City Council 3.5%.

Councillor John Calway, leader of SGC, said:

“Our budget is designed to help South Gloucestershire better withstand the tough economic times we are now in and I am delighted that it has got the support of councillors.”

“Local households are expecting their council to tighten its belt, just as they are.”

“This is why we have confirmed ambitious efficiency savings targets and this newly approved budget will increase the amount of investment needed to achieve these future savings.”

“The council has built up reserves in the good times to allow us to protect services during the bad times.”

Locally, the Capital Budget approved by SGC sees the building of an extension at Bradley Stoke Library brought forward to 2009/2010 from later years.

Bradley Stoke Town Council has already decided to levy no increase in its precept for 2009/2010, but the impact of this for local residents will be swamped by above inflation increases from the Avon & Somerset Police Authority (4.5%) and the Avon Fire Authority.

South Gloucestershire Council (SGC) this week announced an inflation-busting 4.49 per cent increase in council tax for 2008/2009. The rise looks like being the highest amongst the authorities in the former Avon area, with B&NES and N.E. Somerset already agreed on 3.95 per cent and 1.9 per cent respectively and Bristol looking set to agree on 4 per cent. The SGC press release justifies the increase with a list of “significant investments and improvements to many council services”, but the news is unlikely to receive a warm welcome from pensioners (for whom council tax forms a more significant proportion of expenditure than people of working age) and public sector employees (limited to wage increases of just 2% by central government).

The government’s favoured Consumer Prices Index (CPI) measure of inflation is running at 2.2 per cent, whilst the Retail Price Index (RPI) is 4.1 per cent or 3.1 per cent excluding mortgage/rent costs (RPIX).

It is believed that Bradley Stoke Town Council has agreed its precept for 2008/2009, but no information could be found today on the Council’s website. Minutes of the Full Council Meeting on 16th January 2008 have yet to appear on the website, despite the advertised policy of making them available four working days after a meeting.