Residents face 4% council tax hike to combat cuts

Kent residents face another year of inflation-breaking bills after the county council announced plans for a 4% increase in the council tax.

The Conservative-led administration says the hike is needed to help cushion the impact of yet another year of cuts totalling £75m.

If approved, the bill for households in Band C properties would rise by nearly £40 from £1,007.60 to £1,047.84.

Council chiefs say they will use the option of increasing bills by an additional 2% to raise more money for social care – on top of a 1.99% hike.

Like many councils, KCC is facing rising demand for services, particularly those for vulnerable adults, at the same time as the government is giving it less money.

One pressure is the introduction of the National Living Wage, which KCC says will create problems for contractors by pushing up wage bills that would then be The council said it needed to raise tax to reduce the impact of £75m worth of cuts passed on to the authority.

KCC leader Paul Carter said the council had already identified £75m of savings but needed to find £108m to balance the books.

The increased council tax would bring in £23.7m of that shortfall, leaving KCC to find a further £5m.

The d r a f t b u d g e t wi l l mean between 300 and 400 more jobs will be lost but of those about 50 would be compulsory redundancies.

Cl l r Carter s a i d: “The government has placed an enormous challenge on us by imposing some of the biggest cuts compared to other parts of the public sector.

“With forward planning and facing the challenge early on we are now in a better position than most. We totally understand that some transformational plans take many years to implement. We are forward-thinking, have made intelligent commissioning decisions and have the situation in hand.”

The proposed budget includes saving £13.3m in adult care, saving £2m from home-to-school transport, raising £1.9m from selling school support packages and saving £5.2m by converting streetlights to LED bulbs.

The financial challenges facing KCC this year look set to continue for at least another two years and will require “further significant savings” according to cabinet member for finance Cllr John Simmonds.

There will be a six-week consultation on the draft budget.

Full details can be found at kent.gov.uk/budget

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Cllr Paul Carter said the government had created an ‘enormous challenge’ for the council