Too often, councils have got into financial trouble safe in the knowledge they can get an exemption from this rule.
The future of local government under Labour is one in which we pay more for less. We can only hope this permissive approach won’t also apply to the rest of government.
The cost of insuring, securing, maintaining and renovating these properties during this time was over £88 million.
A single person household will use council services far less than a multi-member household. It is reasonable for that to be acknowledged.
The fact that such a basic, crucial service can be so complicated and go wrong so often can be infuriating. There is actually an enormous variation in the number of bin types each council has.
Norfolk Council owns 162,378 pieces of art, with just 735, or 0.5 per cent, on display; Cambridgeshire owns 68,557 and has just 17 on display.
If delivering for local people is the only thing that matters, it’s a recipe for the kind of pork-barrel politics that has dominated the discourse for years.
How can Hampshire County Council regularly brief that it’s on the brink, while it’s able to find a spare £651,000 to hand out to its departing director of culture, community and business services? We need a cap on exit payments and reform of pension arrangements.
It was decided that, despite repeated promises, the experiment, which was due to end in March, would be continued, effectively indefinitely, without a vote and without a consultation.
One option is that as well as revaluation, there would be changes to the bands themselves. The system would become more progressive as a result.
Devolving more tax-raising powers offers a genuine opportunity to ignite healthy competition between the different parties involved in running councils.
One option would be to impose a lower cap, or even a freeze, on council tax rises for councils who haven’t published at least draft accounts. After all, should they be asking for yet more cash from hard-pressed households when they won’t even say how they’re spending it?
There is no denying that working practices have changed. But Town Hall bosses should not indulge in foolish experiments at the expense of Council Taxpayers.
Those paying the most as a percentage of income are not receiving better services than those paying the least. The burden is greater. The benefits are not.
As of 2021, 75 per cent of all councils have declared a climate emergency with varying target dates spawning an endless process of consultations. These projects and schemes all represent time and money that could be devoted to delivering services for residents at value.