County residents face 4.84% council tax hike
Plans will be discussed by the council's overview committee and cabinet members before the budget is presented in February
- Published
Residents in Nottinghamshire are again facing a hike in council tax rates.
Nottinghamshire County Council plans to raise its charges by 2.84%, which will be added to by a 2% rise in a social care precept.
The increase equates to an extra £53.05 and £61.88 per year for Band A and B homes respectively.
Separate changes could also be proposed by district and borough councils, the police and crime commissioner and the Nottinghamshire Fire Authority.
Nottingham City Council plans to raise bills by the maximum 4.99%, while Mansfield District Council has outlined plans to freeze its portion of the bill.
In November, the county council said it faced a funding gap of about £74m over the coming three years, with £24m fuelled by inflation, but it now expects to finish the current financial year roughly on budget.
Plans will be discussed by the council's overview committee and cabinet members this month before the budget is presented in February.
'Balancing act'
Ben Bradley, leader of the authority, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service the council had "bought ourselves some time to do our long-term work" while "trying to protect residents as far as we possibly can".
"I could freeze tax but then have to close all our children's centres, [and] that would be doing a disservice to people in the most disadvantaged parts of our county," he said.
"It's a balancing act and I'm the first person to say raising taxes every year isn't sustainable, but our goal is to get to a place where the council is fully sustainable and we don't need to have those conversations."
However, Kate Foale, leader of the Labour group, accused the Conservative-run authority of "a failure in leadership" by not asking for more funding from central government.
"This is raising council tax on local residents during a cost-of-living crisis with no ask of the government to do better to fund services properly," she said.
"I would say this is not exactly most people in Nottinghamshire's idea of 'levelling up'."