Agenda item

The Council considered a report of the Corporate Director, Resources which sought approval for the continuation of the Local Council Tax Reduction Scheme for a further year into 2017/18 (for copy see file of Minutes).

In Moving the report, Councillor Napier, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Portfolio Holder for Finance, informed the Council that this was the fifth year of the Council supporting the Scheme and he hoped it would receive unanimous support of Members.

Continuation of the Scheme for a further year would continue to protect 34,000 low income families within the County, would award 100% Council Tax support where eligible, and would also protect 26,000 pensioners.  Durham was only one of two Local Authorities in the region to continue to offer this level of support and only one of a dwindling number nationally.

Nearly 23,000 working age claimants were supported by the Scheme, 8,000 of whom did not qualify for benefits but qualified for the Scheme because they were on a low income.  With inflation forecast to rise to between 2% and 3% it was essential that the County Council continued to support the Scheme for as long as it could afford to do so.

In Seconding approval of the Scheme Councillor J Brown, Portfolio Holder for Corporate Services informed the Council that it provided support to the most deprived communities which had suffered an onslaught of welfare changes.  The County Council was one of a few Councils to continue to support such a Scheme and there was evidence that in areas which had drawn back from such level of support Council Tax arrears had increased and working age families had fallen in to the poverty trap.

In supporting continuation of the Scheme for 2017/18 Councillor R Bell sought clarification of the cost referred to in paragraph 14 of the report of £53.2m against the net cost of retaining the Scheme referred to in paragraph 15 of £5.064m.  The Corporate Director, Resources informed Councillor Bell that he would provide him with further information after the meeting.

Councillor Hopgood supported continuation of the Scheme.  Durham was one of few Councils to provide this level of support which was being provided over and above any statutory necessity to do so.

Upon a vote being taken it was

Resolved:

That:

(i)              the current Local Council Tax Reduction Scheme be continued into 2017/18 which will retain the same level of support to all working age council tax payers on low incomes.

(ii)             the extension to the Scheme be initially for a further year only and be kept under continuous review with a further decision on the scheme to apply in 2018/19 to be considered by Cabinet in July/September 2017 and Full Council by January 2018.