Council Tax Benefit Support Grant NALC meet Minister Brandon Lewis MP

COUNCIL TAX BENEFIT SUPPORT GRANT

NALC Chairman Cllr Ken Browse, Chief Executive, Head of Policy and Cllr Dave Roberts from Stratton St Margarets Parish Council, Swindon one of the councils most affected by the Council Tax Reduction Scheme changes, met Brandon Lewis MP on 26th November to address the issue of Council Tax Benefit Support Grant. 

They also had a meeting immediately afterwards with the Shadow Local Government Minister, Andy Sawford MP, who is very supportive.

They set out to the Minister our serious and continuing concerns about this issue:

• the impact on town and parish councils in the current year: even though many billing authorities had passed on the grant, where they had not it had caused major problems for our councils
• the widespread uncertainty about the forthcoming year, with many billing authorities threatening to withhold all or part of the grant; and our councils as a result being unsure of what precept to set
• the potential impact on communities, with our councils either reducing services or increasing precept and council tax levels (which councils in some areas have already done)

They pressed the Minister to issue statutory guidance, or take other measures, to ensure that billing authorities pass on the grant. They pointed out that if our councils were forced to increase precept, they might then be at risk of capping/referenda on council tax.
 
It was stressed that all this uncertainty, and possible cutbacks in spending, ran counter to the Government's expectations of the new and developing localism role for our councils.

In response, the Minister stressed that he continued to be very supportive in ensuring the grant was passed on to our councils. He undertook to approach directly any billing authority where the grant might be withheld.

He explained that he had reiterated on Monday, at the House of Commons despatch box, that all billing authorities should pass on the grant.

He further explained that he would be addressing this issue in the Autumn Statement on the financial settlement for local government (the grant paid by Government to all principal authorities). This was welcomed, but NALC questioned whether it would be a requirement on billing authorities, or just an expectation. He indicated that he would consider this and let us know the outcome 'before Christmas'.

He assured NALC that there would be 'no nasty surprises' on capping and referenda, although he was watching developments in our very largest councils where their precept exceeded that of the district council. We reiterated that these precept figures were misleading, because they did not explain that district councils were heavily subsidised by Government grant.

The rest of the email from NALC Chairman can be read here, all member councils should have received the email directly from NALC.