Sussex residents to pay more for policing
A rise in the council tax precept has been approved
Sussex residents are set to pay an extra £15 in council tax, after councillors backed the Police and Crime Commissioner’s budget proposals for the coming year.
On Friday (January 27), the Sussex Police and Crime Panel gave its backing to plans to increase the Sussex-wide police precept by 6.7 per cent — a figure which means a Band D household would pay £239.91 in police precept across the whole year, £15 more than in 2022/23.
While the figure is the maximum amount allowed by the government, the panel heard how the Sussex Police still expects to face a significant funding shortfall over the next three years as a result of cost increases.
Even with the use of reserves, it is expected savings of around £900,000 will be required to balance the budget for 2023/24, followed by further savings of £17.9m in the three years afterwards.
Sussex Police and Crime Commissioner Katy Bourne said: “We expect to deliver a balanced budget for this coming year, but obviously the future is uncertain. We’ve got a budget shortfall of just over £18m over the remaining period of the 23/24 to 26/27 financial strategy.”
She added: “The successful delivery of policing requires the chief constable to manage quite a complex set of resources, whilst prioritising the demand that comes into policing. It is always evolving as police respond to the social, legal, political and economic landscape in which it operates.
“Although these challenges keep changing — as do the opportunities — Sussex Police remain very focused on keeping people safe in our county.”
While ultimately given the panel’s backing, the budget proposals saw some concerns raised. This was partly due to concerns around cost of living pressures and partly because the public had only been consulted on plans to increase the precept by a figure equal to £10 for a Band D household, before the government increased its cap.
West Sussex County Council’s Cllr James Walsh (Lib Dem) said: “I do not support the £15 increase. The questions that were asked of the public asked the question of £10 or more. The government then step in with a 50 per cent increase in that ceiling — from £10 to £15 — on which the public were not consulted.
“I think that is an underhand way, frankly, of appearing to consult the public but actually coming with a totally different figure.
“Secondly, it is an undeniable fact that Sussex Police have been levying well-above inflation increases for the past few years.”
He added: “To say that it is only such and such a week or a year for Band D houses is ignoring or partly ignoring the fact that we are living in a time of a cost of living crisis, where lots of households are having considerable increases on their household budgets and are really finding it very difficult.”
These concerns saw criticism from Mrs Bourne, who said: “The majority of police officers and police staff that I speak to in Sussex Police are decent men and women. They come to work every day and work really, really hard to keep people safe and keep them protected. We will be doing them a disservice if we do not support this increase today.”
Ultimately, the panel backed Mrs Bourne’s budget proposals for 2023/24, effectively signing off on the increased police precept.
In all, the police precept will account for £154.6m of the police force’s £369.6m budget for 2023/24. The majority of the rest of its income will come from central government grants, although £8m is to be drawn from reserves.