Council tax to rise in Wisbech
Cambridgeshire County Council has agreed an increase
Council tax is going up in Wisbech.
Cambridgeshire County Council has today (9 February) approved a 2.99% increase from April.
This will add an extra 40 pounds a 59 pence to an annual bill for a Band D property.
It was part of the budget, approved for 2021/22, which the authority say is aimed at keeping the council tax burden as low as possible for residents, while still investing in things most important to them.
In proposing his budget amendment, approved by a majority vote, Councillor Steve Count - Leader of Cambridgeshire County Council - set out plans to invest almost £30m more over the next five years in key areas such as footpaths, flooding prevention, biodiversity and key road improvements.
Councillor Count outlined a package of additional investment as part of his budget proposal to meet areas which are currently high local priorities - referring to similar action in previous years when the council had made additional investments of £24m in Highways and £16m to accelerate plans to reach Carbon Net Zero by investing in making its buildings more efficient and moving its vehicle fleet to electric.
The new proposals will see additional investment over the next five years of
£20 million extra in footpath maintenance with 50% of this sum to be spent on surface treatments, such as footway repairs, and the other 50% on deeper treatments, such as resurfacing and reconstruction. This is in addition to the current annual budget for footpath maintenance across Cambridgeshire of £1.3m
£2.73 million extra in measures to prevent flooding and improve local biodiversity. This will include new measures such as rapid gully clearing at all known risk sites, better verge maintenance on rural roads avoiding peak flowering times and an urban verge 'cut and collect' trial, plus a series of initiatives to provide both active and practical support for local communities to address flooding
£6.97 million in improvements to the B1050 Shelfords Road at Willingham. This site has been a well-known, longstanding concern for a number of years is a busy route, and one of only a limited number of river crossings, and a main commuter route from the Fens towards Cambridge and the A14. Significant work has regularly been undertaken on this road in an attempt to keep it safe and serviceable, but historic construction destabilised by poor ground conditions make it a prime candidate for a full reconstruction. Without which it would ultimately need to be closed.
Councillor Count said:
"Now more than ever we need to concentrate on keeping the burden of tax as low as possible for our residents.
"The Coronavirus pandemic has impacted on our residents and their families, our way of life and the local as well as national economy. To automatically inflict the maximum possible increase, of 4.99% is unthinkable to us."
So to achieve the extra investment, and close a predicted budget gap in the next financial year of £9.6million, the accepted proposal was for the council to;
Release an immediate £4.115m in revenue in 2021/2 by halting any further top-ups to the Transformation Fund from the Council's Minimum Revenue Provision
Redeploy £3.767m already in the Transformation Fund for one year - to keep any possible council tax rise as low as possible.
Councillor Count added:
"Only as a last resort, my administration recommended to Council that it should balance the remaining budget gap by setting the Adult Social Care Precept at 1% and Council Tax at 1.99%."
A 2.99% increase will add an annual £40.59 to a Band D Council tax bill, or 78p per week.
Councillor Count added:
"Benchmarking from external independent sources, shows that we are a low-cost authority with good outcomes. We provide high quality services yet still have £155 a head less to spend than the county average.
"The reason we have and we will continue to campaign for fairer funding, is because quite staggeringly, if Cambridgeshire residents received the same core funding allocation as London residents, this Council would receive an additional £132m per year."