WOKINGHAM’S Council Tax will increase by 2.99% overall, but the picture is ‘resilient’.
This week, councillors will vote on the proposals to increase the amount borough householders will pay. The exact amount varies across the 17 towns and parishes, as each has a precept to pay to the local council.
There is also an add-on for the fire and rescue service, and the police.
As part of its budget, it is promising that there will be no increasing in car park charges this year, or any cuts to services, despite growing demand to children’s services and adult social care.
Cllr John Kaiser, the deputy leader of the council and executive member for finance, said: “This year’s proposed budget is cautious, but I am pleased to say we will not be cutting any services. We have tried to either keep fees and charges to a minimum or where possible, like car parking charges, not increased them at all to help the borough’s economy recover.
“We will also prioritise social housing and look to deliver more homes at social rents. Due to the lack of suitable housing and increase in private rents, even affordable housing is out of the reach for many in our borough who are on low incomes.
“We don’t take any decisions to raise council tax lightly and with inflation running at more than 5%, which the council is not immune to, it’s been a difficult decision this year, especially as we are aware of the rising costs of living which is impacting everyone.”
This view was echoed by council leader John Halsall, who said: “The key tenant is that we are resilient.
“We are one of the highest performing councils in the country, we are one of the most prosperous, most healthy, the least amount of deprivation, and one of the top places that people want to move to.
“We have a climate emergency plan which has been held up as an exemplar.”
He continued: “We’re doing a whole load of things absolutely right, which is no coincidence that it’s 20 years of a Conservative administration.”
He said the council faced a number of headwinds which needed to be dealt with as they came up, including inflation, the housing lists, challenges with adult social care and children’s services, school funding and places.
“We will deal with them because we’ve got a very, very good and confident administration,” he said. “We’ve steered this shop through the really uncertain waters of covid, and we’re asking people to have faith in us that we can steer the ship through these next 12 months, which will be very, very challenging.
“We don’t know how those headwinds will manifest themselves, but given that I’ve got a reasonably good relationship with my party, and in Westminster, I’m confident that I can, at least, alleviate the force of those headwinds, if not change them as we did over covid.”
The budget, he said, was “deliberately designed” to help protect Wokingham’s vulnerable, and to protect the local economy.
