Council tax discrepancies

[monkeysox]

This makes me really angry.
Council tax for band E property in Westminster £1,056.16

Council tax for us in small NE town also band E for comparison £2,648.87

Yes houses are generally cheaper but this monthly, and usually unavoidable cost is way more.

Wages are generally lower here too.

Aibu in thinking these charges should be consistent country wide.

As they pay for local services and the amount of council tax payable is set by the local Council it is not another council's fault if yours charges more.

Ha!

look at the size of that property in Westminster compared with size of yours

I think the council takes their wider income into account when setting rates

so in areas with lots of shops paying business rates, the council tax is lower

So quieter rural places will have higher council tax because they don’t have as many businesses paying rates

See it as the ‘quiet tax’ or the price you pay for not having millions of tourists descending for their Christmas shopping/weekend out/theatre trips

And council tax is probably the only thing that’s cheaper in London than elsewhere, so let us have one thing

yours,
a resident of Wandsworth borough with the lowest council tax in the UK

Westminster council tax banding is based on one thing and one thing only.
the value of the property in 1991

Your view is hinged on idea that “quieter” rural places are more appealing than cities.

for some, yes

for other like me, 100% no no no!

Wandsworth has always been ridiculously low (I used to live there)

Its a reflection of how well run the council is so if yours is now ridiculously high (as is mine in Tandridge), vote the fuckers out when you get a chance. Never happens round her though, they all continuously vote Tory, like sheep, because that is what everyone has been doing for 100 years.

I would say transport and getting about in London is probably cheaper generally than where we are in the SW to be honest, but that's because the public transport offering here is ridiculously limited. We are band C, but band E here is £2,465. Yes house prices are cheaper than London, but also a lot more expensive than in NE on average I think and we don't have London wages generally. It might be fairer if more standardised, but this government would likely just make us all pay more rather than anyone pay less!

I have always thought council tax is really low when you actually consider what it includes
police
waste
fire
Education
parks
social care

i could go on

YANBU. I don’t think it’s coincidence that the boroughs where the MPs live just happen to have the lowest council tax rates. London always gets a larger share than it should of the government annual finance settlements to local authorities.

So I will!

roads
leisure centres
libraries
environmental health
trading standard

🙄

Mines more than that for a Band B for 2 bed flat in the south! (Westminster one that is!)

I pay more than that with the 25% discount!

The “levelling up” funds were divvied up the same way as all central gov funds to local councils- more £ per person for the richer areas than the poorer areas. The more central government finance your local authority gets, the lower the council tax.

“But analysis of the £4.7bn allocated under the levelling up agenda to date shows how some of England’s most deprived areas are receiving far less support than some of the richest boroughs.”
www.theguardian.com/inequality/2022/feb/02/levelling-up-funding-inequality-exposed-by-guardian-research

90% of the money spent by councils is provided by central government, 10% is raised by council tax, if you want your bill to go down lobby your mp for a better settlement for your area, especially if they are a tory

Shitty Tory mp