Every spring we receive our Council tax bills, which also come with information broken down by cost for the services that we pay for.
This is a format that the Coalition Government are now using for income tax payers, so that we can now also see where the Government spends our income tax. I welcome this transparency but find it disappointing that some in Labour circles criticised this move, because they prefer to hide from taxpayers how much is spent on benefits.
Next year will see the fifth successive annual Council tax freeze for both West Sussex County Council and Crawley Borough Council. This will mean that the entire five-year term of the Conservative-led government has seen Council tax bills frozen, as opposed to the last Labour government which oversaw the doubling of Council tax. The freeze has been brought about by financial incentives from Government for Councils to be responsible with their finances.
However, there is a proposal for next year from Sussex Police, which is one of the three elements of our Council tax bill, to have a 1.98% rise that follows their 1.95% rise this year. Sussex Police are currently consulting on this and my personal view is that the Police should also freeze their element of the Council tax, and not waste resources investigating silly and spurious complaints, such as the Lewes Bonfire Society having an effigy of Alex Salmond.
I would urge Crawley residents to look at the consultation and to give their own feedback. The consultation can be easily found online by searching for “Sussex police 2015 budget consultation”. The reasons for the proposed increase are given so residents can say whether they feel it is worth paying a little more for services or if the police should aim to do more with their existing funding. Whatever one’s view, the fact that residents can have such input into local services and that any Council tax rise over 2% now requires a local referendum, shows that the Conservative-led government is serious about giving residents a real say on local spending and services.