MSE News: Households facing sharp rise in council tax bills over next two years

i dont like the sound of this proposal. our council has one of the highest taxes in england and yet they find any excuse to hike up the costs.

Councils had already been told that they could put up the taxes by 6% over three years. The government have only changed things so that councils can shorten the period to two years.

Of course this extra tax will come nowhere near the money that the government are taking away from councils over the next few years.

But the intention is that councils will get the blame for rising taxes and falling services, and not the government.

They are certainly not allowing bed blocking here. I have a neighbour who has been taken to hospital 3 times in the last month & they still keep shipping him home. Any half competent idiot can see he is not fit to be left at home alone. He belongs in a care home but he has no money (house has all gone to equity release) the LA has no money to fund. The police have taken a gun off him - no charges - what would be the point. Local vulnerable adult people won't come because he is too aggressive (only verbally so far luckily). Local children have seen parts of his body that no child should be subjected to.

So in a nutshell, if a rise in council tax gets him the care he needs & us the peace of mind, then it would be worth every penny.

Money could quite easily be saved if they stopped giving themselves insane pay rises. Everyone else has had to cut back, time they did their bit along with MP's. Same goes for the vanity projects someone else mentioned. Their own offices have been refurbed at considerable cost.

They are throwing silly money into a project to move together to move the library and some other facilities. They had only just funded a library refurb when they decided this! Green waste charges have gone ahead after a sneaky survey they didn't promote until it was closed. The majority (albeit of relatively few respondents who found it in time) said collections should be cut instead. They charge the same for green waste regardless of the size of the property and wonder why some opt out. They made a roundabout more dangerous by adding another lane and now they want to put traffic lights on it because there are too many accidents. These rises may not be their fault but they shouldn't be surprised at getting the blame when they carry on like this.

The elderly should fund more of their own care. Time the almost £25 weekly pocket money and/or asset limits for support were looked at. The JAM's won't have that left a week.

minislim wrote: »

My local council (oldham) had a choice several years ago to either raise council tax below 2% or above 2% but be penalised with extra cuts from central government. as this was at a time when the coalition was trying to reign councils spending patterns which have in some cases got completely out of control!

guess which one they chose? 3.1%

now they're pleading poverty. saying they've been hit with deeper cuts than other authorities. all because of their initial greed and incompetence!

yet strangely they have undertaken two vanity projects in excess of £45 million with little outside funding.

i say take this cost out of the hands of the councils! i'd rather pay for it out of my income tax. but they'd better give a council tax cut too!

The issue with the cinema is compounded by the fact they've gifted the building to a billion dollar multi-national company for 10 years. This company has not paid a penny towards the refurb. It gets the building at no cost, as do some of the cafe's/restaurants etc for anything upto 2 years.

The town hall needed to be used in some way, but it should not have been paid for using taxpayers money. Especially when there are far more important things that need attention in Oldham.

As for the Mumps/Princes Gate project. That was always destined to be a white elephant.

If they wanted a development at Mumps then a Cinema would have made much more sense being located there with ample parking, the metrolink stop right outside, easy road access.

We can only hope that any future development offers something the town needs, I.e a multi-purpose entertainment venue, which could accommodate live music, comedy for well known/mainstream bands and comedians, 10 pin bowling, lazer quest, community hall, learning/lifelong learning and development, etc... and not at the expense of other services.