Issue - meetings

This item is due to be pre-scrutinised at a meeting of the Budget Scrutiny Working Group scheduled to take place on 2^nd January 2024.  Any recommendations in respect of this report, subject to the endorsement of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, will be reported to the Executive Committee in a supplementary pack for this meeting.

The Portfolio Holder for Finance and Enabling presented the Discretionary Council Tax Reduction Policy - Council Section 13A(C) Policy report. In doing so it was explained that the Council had power under S13A(1)(C) of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 to reduce the amount of Council Tax a person was liable for. This power could be exercised on a case by case basis. 

The Executive Committee was informed that a current example of this was relief for Care Leavers which was undertaken across the County and reimbursed by Worcestershire County Council (WCC). A further example of this was Severe Weather (for example flooding) where Council Tax was waived for at least three months with this being reimbursed to the Council by the Government. 

The framework allowed the Council to make local decisions with the Policy, which it was noted, had not changed from the previous year and was set out in the appendix to the covering report.

Members were reminded that there was already Council Tax relief available for residents on low incomes through the Council Tax Support Scheme. This report was due to be considered later on in the meeting.

The Portfolio Holder for Finance and Enabling stated that should reliefs be given, and were not reimbursed by Government, then the Council had to fund any payments made. It was confirmed that the Council had not made any of these individual reliefs for a number of years.

Following the presentation of the report, it was queried whether there was a cap on the number of individual reliefs awarded per year. It was clarified that this was not the case, and if it were, it would result in having to include a budget line within the Council’s budget which stated how much these reliefs would cost on an annual basis and how much was allocated per year.

RECOMMENDED that

1)    The Section 13A(1)(C) policy be approved and adopted from 1st April 2024.