Archived press release

Date Published: 08/12/06

Residents in Aylesbury Vale are looking at a district council tax increase of 4.4 per cent next year. A provisional budget was proposed by AVDC’s cabinet at a meeting this week. Under the proposals, Aylesbury Vale taxpayers living in Band D...

Residents in Aylesbury Vale are looking at a district council tax increase of 4.4 per cent next year.

A provisional budget was proposed by AVDC’s cabinet at a meeting this week. Under the proposals, Aylesbury Vale taxpayers living in Band D properties would pay £121.26 for services provided by AVDC next year, compared to £116.10 this year. This works out at approximately 10p per week extra.

A council tax increase of 4.4 per cent, which is lower than last year’s rise, will mean that the average household in the Vale will be paying only around £2.30 per week for the full range of district services including refuse collection, street cleaning and planning.

The council is planning to spend £19.39 million on services in 2007/8. Financial constraints limit the council’s ability to do much more than maintain services at current levels. However, the council intends to promote more affordable housing schemes, maintain crime reduction and anti-social behaviour activities and extend its recycling schemes to help meet government targets. 

Each year the council faces additional costs from the impact of inflation that exceed the extra money raised from council tax and government support.

The initial budget proposals take account of the amount of funding the council will receive from the government. This grant will be a 2.7 per cent increase on last year’s funding.

The district council acts as the ‘billing agent’ for Buckinghamshire County Council, Thames Valley Police, the fire service and town and parish councils. But of the overall bill that drops through the
letterboxes of local residents – only a small amount, 10 per cent, is kept by the district. It passes on the rest to the other public bodies.

Councillor Margaret Morgan-Owen, Cabinet Member for Resources, said: “The council has worked hard to be in a sound financial position as we face a number of challenges over the next few years. We have a low level of council tax but still manage to provide a wide range of quality services. We have embarked on a programme of reviewing our costs across the council in order to keep the budget in balance whilst maintaining services.”

She added: “Unfortunately for us the amount of cash we expect to receive from the government as their contribution to the cost of our services does not reflect the anticipated growth we are expected to accommodate over future years. Unless we receive a reasonable grant from Whitehall it will become increasingly difficult to deliver the services our community need.”

The budget proposal package will be referred to the council’s scrutiny committees for consideration. Cabinet will meet to consider comments on the draft proposals and make their final recommendations on 16 January 2007. The budget will then be debated and set by full council on 7 February and will come into force on 1 April.