To be scared about how we will cope with more tax rises - council tax

[partytimed]

i really loathe this government. Usually with politics I feel like whoever is in charge I don’t notice much of a direct impact on my day to day life. Yes I’m aware of slow erosions in public services and I was no fan at all of the tories, I voted for this government im ashamed to say, and they lied and lied about their plans. I am so much worse off and if they double council tax bands virtually all of our disposable income is going to be gone. It feels like theft. I don’t trust them to spend the money I make properly it all feels corrupt and it’s just so depressing and upsetting.

Quite! Those say do the maths are deluded. I’d be more than happy to pay more council tax if it meant the streets would be cleaned and services improved. But we know that nothing will change. The increase in tax will simply go into the huge debt void never to be seen again.

21 million households aren’t affected by the council tax suggested cganges

183,000 possible are effected by the suggested proposed changes to council tax

its the 21 million homes that have been mugged off

There is an interactive map in today's daily mail, that shows how much council tax is paid across the country, it may be elsewhere for those allergic to the DM. The differences across the country are quite shocking

i don’t like it when people liberally throw insults like “random ableism” around and tell people to look up facts then fail to understand or accurately represent facts themselves.

I don’t know where the original poster got the 23% from but I do know this field. The number is correct but not for all the reasons you say.

Around 25% of the working age population reports having a disability. Thats got nothing to do with population ageing and actually the biggest growth in ill health has been seen among younger people reporting mental health concerns. Which in turn is down to a complex mix of poor opportunities, poor access to services (including from austerity), as well as a hangover from the pandemic.

Disability is usually a self reported statistic based on the extent to which a set of symptoms (from anything) limits your ability to live / work etc. there are various methodologies, but it doesn’t mean that 25% are claiming benefits although it likely means a very high proportion are not working or not working as much as they could have done and therefore risk needing benefits in the future if not today. There’s an excellent article here which is more factual: https://www.economicsobservatory.com/growing-prevalence-of-disability-what-implications-for-the-uk-economy

It’s well known that disability stats are somewhat unreliable because they are self reported. However, the clear trend is that we have had rapidly increasingly levels of ill health and disability among working age population.

Personally I agree with the pp that it’s very hard to see how this is entirely credible and how much of this is a complex product of circumstances rather than actual limiting conditions. That’s the problem the govt has to address somehow. The trends are clear, but it’s not right that a quarter of the working age population is … for whatever reason… reporting a disability.

It’s a huge problem that society can ill afford and it’s something that keeps me awake at night even more so than the ageing of the population (although this is part of the demography behind it). The longer people are out of work the lower their prospects are in the future so as a country alarm bells should be ringing - people need opportunity and purpose. It has to come from a combination of society, jobs and the economy, and the individual and their communities themselves. And everything is pointing in the wrong direction.

I'm unsure why people are complaining about prices of water bills with Thames Water on this thread?

Cast your mind back to the 1980s...

The Conservative party, led by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, was the political party responsible for privatising the water and sewerage industry in England and Wales in 1989

It's been a shit show for many years with the rich getting their dividend payments from the water companies, instead of any monies being used to modernise the system. Now we have pollution (on a grand scale) and ludicrously high bills.

DH and I just had this conversation last night—that we’re going to get hammered in the budget, and brainstorming how we can batten down the hatches. Our +40% water bill increase this month isn’t particularly helpful either. The problem is, I already do the YNAB budgeting app, so I already have a tight rein on spending as it is. Our ideas on trimming the fat were to cut the following out of our budget:

• we eat out or get a takeaway about once every 8 weeks - we’ll only eat at home
• we have a cleaner once a fortnight - we’ll let her go
• stop our direct debit donations to NSPCC, Red Cross, Air Ambulance, and our local hospice (sounds horrible, but we have to put on our own oxygen masks on first)
• no retail shopping that’s not absolutely essential—make due with what we have, or go without

Council Tax is a local tax paid at a local level and spent locally. If an area has low levels of Council Tax then they will have less money to spend on these services that their residents use. So if a London borough can afford to charge less then it's outgoings are probably less. If you have an area with high Council Tax then the chances are that the costs of delivering these services is higher within your area.

People are trying to make Council Tax a national tax where rich areas with less costs subsidise poorer areas with higher costs. We already have lots of these taxes and it's arguably very undemocratic to bring Council Tax under this umbrella. You have the ability in your area to vote for your Council and they can make spending and tax raising decisions. Someone in London doesn't have that power, yet you want them to fund your Council's spending decisions.

So if a London borough can afford to charge less then it's outgoings are probably less.

Yes, as those multimillionaire houses are owned by people that don't actually need to use public services

so westminster G band is £2,717

council tax is collected at local level, for central government - then redistributed by central goverment

We need to start thinking serious. The benefits system should be a safety net not a way of life. We have whole families who have never worked which is not only a drain financially it is making generations grow up with no pride. I see mums in shops and at school gates in dressing gowns! No self respect. And we all need to admit that having foreign nationals move here on mass not just illegals but legal who can access all our services nhs schools child benefits housing is a just not sustainable. In other countries if you move on a work visa you would have to self fund all your life and if you lost your job and didn’t find another you would be forced to leave.
we have many do gooders who think the world can come for free people feeling a little down shouldn’t work and everyone else should pay for it. They need to come back to the real world because nothing is free every penny the government spends is our money so the more they spend the more we have to give.

And the reason the rich areas in London pay less than say my area in council tax is because they all work and they all pay. We have to cover the many that don’t work

Well you all laughed when they came for the elderly, sick and disabled. Now there's no body that'll be prepared to fight for you.

Enjoy working to fund the boat peoples' cushy lives here.

What if you can't pay it? What of the landlord puts up your rent?
More debt? And debt isn't inexhaustible.
The computer says no for lots of inexplicable reasons. So finally become homeless, or on benefits in a b&b with the kids.

More taxes to pay for my benefit existence. More people get poorer.

Austerity! Shout the politicians. Again.

Yes, well they would, would they? Squander it on rubblish, and then want more. All parties, labour are worse because ' it's all for your own good'
There is no disposable income left.

So, let's see exactly what it's all being spent on. A list. Not analytics, not treasury models. I'm sure there is plenty to stop.

If it was a marriage, the advice would be - they won't change, sunk costs, LTB

It's largely the spiralling costs associated with the elderly, sick and disabled that is forcing this Council tax rise. If you don't believe me, look at a breakdown of how your local council spends money.

That’s mental !

I read your post like a poem / song 😸

Broadly money collected via Council Tax by an area will be spent within that area. Some might go to regional police commissioners etc but it still doesn't fund national services.

Someone who lives in a mansion will probably have paid an awful lot of tax via the national taxation system. Stamp Duty, Income Tax, CGT etc are all collected nationally. They are already subsidising poorer people and therefore poorer areas a great deal through this. To pretend they aren't and that they also need to fund other people's local services that they not only can't access but have absolutely no say over is bonkers. We are in real danger of killing the golden goose.

What would you cut?

Health and Social care? Education? Roads? Libraries? SEN?

In pretty much all councils, spending has been slashed to the bone.

Yes you could cut CEO salaries or extend the lease on pool cars for another year but that would save £1000s.... A Council needs millions and billions nationally.

Savings are like taxes, everyone wants something cut but not what they use or get.

I wounder how many backing Reform would want their UC removed and told to work more hours?

Or want less Social Care visits, until its their Mum who now gets 2 visits instead of 4 daily.

I already pay £4k a year for services I barely use and those that I do (bin collection) are shit - our bins didn’t get emptied for weeks because some plank at the council didn’t renew their waste carrier licence. There is no justification for my council tax doubling, whatever my house is worth.

the middle is paying for the golden goose to get fat, the 21 million households are paying more than their fair share. It’s about time the golden goose paid up in proportion rather than getting discounts

Absolutely.

Our council is prioritising services we don't use.

My children are grown up and don't live with us. Why does the value of my house matter more than the services I use? The house across the road has a family with three children and a granny. Their house is worth less, but they use much more than I do. Why aren't they asked to pay more for what they use?

No they are not. Usage of services has nothing to do with the value of a house.

Tax doesn't work like that and never has.... i assume you or your kids went to a state school? if not, your private school teachers would have been trained by the state....
Perhaps childless couples should get a tax rebate? or maybe i can get one too as i've no street lighting?

But many posts on here show why this country is in the mess it is in..... few are willing to pay more tax, they want to pay less but get better schools, roads, GP services, AE, faster Ambulances etc etc.

Similar for us, we spend 35 a month by DD for charity donations, that will have to go.

That only makes sense if you assume that wealthier people should pay more for absolutely everything by virtue of the fact they have more money. Are the rich being subsidised by the middle because the rich don't pay more at supermarkets or for the hairdressers? Should every single service and good have a graduated cost depending on how wealthy you are? It obviously makes no sense. Generally people pay a fixed price for a goods and services. For Council Tax we have a situation where the rich use the services less than everyone else, already pay a lot more and yet you are claiming that they are still getting a discount. Your entitlement to other people's money is astounding

No, they went to private school, as it were.

But even if they did go to state, what's the value of the house have to do with services used?

Does school education go magically more expensive for the council when the child in question happens to live in a more expensive house?

Is my rubbish more expensive to collect? No, it's actually a lot less than the one the family of five produce in their house that's probably worth less than mine?

We have one car, and love walking, they have two. Who used the roads more?

Happy to pay my share, but it needs to be fair.