Agenda item

The Cabinet is requested to consider the agenda report and its three appendices and to make the following recommendation to the Council:

That the proposed Council Tax Reduction Scheme for 2018-2019 be approved.

RECOMMENDED TO THE COUNCIL

That the proposed Council Tax Reduction Scheme for 2018-2019 be approved.

The Cabinet received and considered the agenda report and its three appendices in the first agenda supplement.

The report was presented by Mrs Hardwick.

Mrs Rogers was in attendance for this item.

Mrs Hardwick said that Council Tax Reduction (CTR) had been localised for working age people in 2013 and the Council Tax Reduction Scheme (CTRS) applied to them but not to pensioners, who continued to receive support via national rules. Although the CTRS was initially funded out of the central government grant (albeit reduced by 10%), since 2014-2015 government support for CDC’s local scheme had been subsumed into the overall government revenue support. Unlike many other local authorities, CDC had protected its CTRS recipients from that funding cut and instead broadly maintained the same level of support to its communities (Mid Sussex District Council (MSDC) had done likewise). Universal Credit (UC) was due to be rolled out for CDC’s working age residents as from April 2018. In the obligatory CTRS annual consultation (approved by the Cabinet in July 2017) in August and September 2017, CDC consulted on some possible changes to the 2018-2019 CTRS, namely (a) introducing a new category (class F) for claimants in receipt of UC and (b) continuing to support lowest earners (including via discretionary hardship assistance) while ensuring the administration would (i) be as simple and cost effective as possible, (ii) well targeted, (iii) minimise disincentives to work, (iv) provide the best value for money and (v) be as straightforward for the claimants as possible.  There continued to be important protections for war widows, widower pensions and war disablement pensions as well as maintaining work incentives in the form of earned income disregards and a taper for removing support. The full details were in the appendices. Although to date the cost of administering the CTRS local scheme had been funded by the Department for Communities and Local Government, as pointed out in para 6.3 of the report, that funding for administration had fallen by 4.6% to £115,000 for 2017-2018 and the trajectory was likely to continue.  It was incumbent on CDC to react to welfare reforms in a way that mitigated the effects of increased costs. Save for the element of administration, the cost of the CTRS benefit paid to recipients was shared by all precepting authorities (CDC’s share was around 9%). In 2017-2018 the CTRS benefit cost around £6.9m overall.  It had remained fairly constant since 2013 but economic downturns and widespread welfare reform might raise the demand for the CTRS. There were 71 consultation responses and opinion was broadly in favour of the new banded scheme for Class F and the continuation of the discretionary hardship fund. The report proposed to base the CTRS 2018-2019 on the appended draft.  The CTRS needed to be approved by the Council before 31 January 2018, which it was hoped would happen when the Council met on 21 November 2017. This would in turn assist in setting the tax base in December 2017.

Mrs Rogers did not wish to add to Mrs Hardwick’s introduction. 

Mrs Taylor asked whether housing associations had been involved in the consultation, since their tenants were likely to be recipients of the CTRS. Mrs Rogers undertook to make enquiries and inform members after this meeting.

[Note Members were informed the following day by Democratic Services that Mrs Rogers had ascertained that the housing associations had on this occasion not been consulted directly to advise them of the online consultation, which had been promoted via social media. (As respondents were not required to identify themselves, if a housing association had commented it was unlikely to be evident.)]

In closing Mr Dignum emphasised how unlike all other West Sussex local authorities save for MSDC, CDC had consistently protected its most vulnerable council tax payers. The principles of the CTRS remained unchanged notwithstanding the technical change due to UC.     

Decision

The Cabinet voted unanimously on a show of hands in favour of making the recommendation set out below.

RECOMMENDED TO THE COUNCIL

That the proposed Council Tax Reduction Scheme for 2018-2019 be approved.