Council tax rises in Wiltshire approved
A rise of 5% has been given the go-ahead
Plans to increase council tax in Wiltshire by almost 5% have been approved.
During a Full Council meeting on Tuesday (20th February), the increase was given the green light.
It includes a 2% levy which is to be spent solely on adult social care.
Band D households will now pay £1,805.73 across the year, a rise of £1.65 per week.
The council's prudent and preventative approach to managing it's finances has put it in a strong position, with an underspend of £634,000 being forecast for this year (2023/24), allowing an extra £36 million to be added to the council's service budgets.
However, the council say there is still need to spend sensibly to mitigate the impact of inflationary pressures.
A budget that leads to investment
Council Leader Richard Clewer says the budget will allow them to invest "significantly" in key services including highways, maintenance, flood prevention, and decarbonisation.
The bulk of the council's spend in 2024/25 will be across the following areas:
• Adult services - £179.4m
• Families and children - £70.8m
• Environment - £49.6m
• Highways and transport - £43m
• Education and skills - £38.9m
Cllr Clewer said: “In contrast to some other local authorities that are unfortunately facing some difficult challenges, our finances are strong. This is down to two main factors – firstly we take a long-term approach, identifying where we know demand will grow and investing to mitigate that increase in need or demand.
"Secondly, we focus on prevention, and invest in those areas that we know will benefit residents and save money in the long-term. Prevention underpins everything we do – to use an old adage ‘a stitch in time saves nine’.
“We’re not immune to some of the challenges other councils are facing, but to ensure we are in the strongest position to continue to tackle the fluctuating rate of inflation and to deal with higher costs we have made the necessary decision to increase the council element of council tax by 4.99%.
“However, the bottom line is that because of our robust, preventative and prudent financial management we can invest more money into the services we provide for our residents, businesses and communities.”
Commitment to invest over a number of years
The council's also outlined its programme for capital spend, in a commitment to invest over the next next seven years. The budget has been set at around £285m and will see improvement and maintenance of the county's infrastructure.
Some of the capital spend in 2024/25 will include:
• Building and refurbishing council houses – £45m
• Structural maintenance and bridges - £21m
• A350 Chippenham and Melksham bypass ongoing work - £18m
• Trowbridge and Salisbury Future High Streets - £11m
• Highways investment plan – £7m
• Property carbon reduction programme inc. solar canopies – £5m
• Investment in leisure centres – £3m
• Trowbridge Leisure Centre – £800,000 (with more than £20m allocated in subsequent financial years)