{"id":23261,"date":"2019-03-05T17:23:33","date_gmt":"2019-03-05T17:23:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/?p=23261"},"modified":"2019-03-05T17:27:34","modified_gmt":"2019-03-05T17:27:34","slug":"council-tax-capping-explained","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/council-tax-capping-explained\/","title":{"rendered":"Council tax capping &#8211; explained"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Council tax is going up at an average of 6.4%\u00a0across Wales.<\/p>\n<p>The rises have been agreed in the last few weeks, with <a href=\"http:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/cardiff-council-tax-increase-how-much-will-it-cost-you\/\">Cardiff<\/a> up 4.9%, Newport up 5.95% and Caerphilly facing 6.95% hikes.<\/p>\n<h3><strong>What is the extra money being used for?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Council tax is used to fund basic services, such as waste collection, as well as paying for the precepts of local police.<\/p>\n<p>The recent council tax rises in South East Wales &#8211; which on average are 4% above inflation &#8211; are being used to fund councils which are strapped for cash as austerity continues to bite.<\/p>\n<p>Cardiff has a \u00a332m blackhole in its budget, while Merthyr has a \u00a314.9m budget deficit over the next four years.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Cardiff Council approves plans for council tax rise and over 50 job losses to tackle \u00a332m budget gap: <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/1kbr9hM2K9\">https:\/\/t.co\/1kbr9hM2K9<\/a> via <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/psenews?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@PSENews<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Nigel_Brinn (@PowysCC_HTR) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/PowysCC_HTR\/status\/1101542828570755077?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">March 1, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h3>Where are the highest increases?<\/h3>\n<p>Last night Merthyr Tydfil County Borough Council <a href=\"http:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/methyr-tydfil-council-tax-to-rise-6-from-next-month\/\">announced<\/a> a council tax increase of 5.99%, joining the ranks of some of the highest rises in the UK.<\/p>\n<p>Confirmed and projected rises across Wales show an average rise of 6.4%, which means more than \u00a395 a year more for a property in Band D.<\/p>\n<p>At the top end of the increases, Pembrokeshire County Council is rising by 9.9% and Councillors in Conwy backed a 9.6% hike.<\/p>\n<h3>Isn&#8217;t council tax capped at 5%?<\/h3>\n<p>The National Assembly of Wales has the power to cap council tax rises. In the past, it&#8217;s had an informal limit of a 5%.<\/p>\n<p>But in January this year Rebecca Evans AM, Minister for Finance and Trefnydd, seemed to go back on that cap. She said: &#8220;The setting of council tax rates and levels is very much an issue for each local authority to decide independently of Welsh Government interference.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h3>What do people think about it?<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.assembly.wales\/en\/gethome\/e-petitions\/Pages\/petitiondetail.aspx?PetitionID=1482\">A petition<\/a> has been started urging the Senedd to cap council tax rises at the rate of inflation.<\/p>\n<p>Tom Maclean, who started the petition, says &#8220;with child poverty and household debt rising&#8221; the increases &#8220;cripple households&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>The National Assembly hasn&#8217;t responded to the petition, and with councils approving council tax rises at nearly double the informal cap, don&#8217;t look likely to intervene soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Council tax is going up at an average of 6.4%\u00a0across Wales. The rises have been agreed in the last few weeks, with Cardiff up 4.9%, Newport up 5.95% and Caerphilly facing 6.95% hikes. What is the extra money being used for? Council tax is used to fund basic services, such as waste collection, as well [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[743,744],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23261"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23261"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23261\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23308,"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23261\/revisions\/23308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jomec.co.uk\/cjsnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}