COUNCIL tax will go up 9.9% in Conwy. This means, for an average band-D home in the county, residents will pay £1,580.53 in council tax a year – £142.38 extra.
At a meeting today at Bodlondeb 36 councillors voted in favour of the new budget compared to 13 who voted against the proposals.
They were told rising energy prices, care fees, children’s care, housing and homelessness, and national pay awards, as well as North Wales Fire service’s precept, had caused a resource shortfall of £21,734,000.
Both councillors and officers admitted the council-tax increase would impact the most on the vulnerable, including those on low wages, with budget cuts also affecting children in schools.
Lead member for finance Cllr Mike Priestley said the situation was the worst the authority had ever faced. He said: “This is the worst budget I’ve ever had to work on or been part of, and I’ve been a councillor since 2004.
“That (years of experience as a councillor) is topped by Cllr Goronwy (Edwards) who has been a councillor a lot longer, and he said this has been the worst financial situation we’ve found ourselves in.
“We have not overspent. I’m putting that on the record now. We have had pressures coming at us left, right, and centre.”
He added: “It has been a horrendous financial year. I didn’t want to be here with a rise like that. These are pressures that are out of our control.”
The council was also forced to take £720,000 from its reserves to balance the books because of a last-minute pay national increase to local government staff, despite being advised earlier to protect its savings.
Council leader Cllr Charlie McCoubrey said the situation was even worse than he had foreseen 10 months ago when he appointed Cllr Priestley as cabinet member for finance, but he also said increasing costs were out of the council’s control.
“As I did last year as leader, it is right and proper that I take full and final responsibility for this budget,” he said.
“When I asked Cllr Mike (Priestley) to take on the job (of cabinet member for finance), it was a £6m pressure (shortfall) I was worried about at the time. Clearly we would give our back teeth to be in that situation now.”
Cllr McCoubrey then criticised the formula used by Welsh Government to calculate the annual Local Government Settlement.
Conwy received only a 7.3% increase in its last settlement, which was less than the national average of 7.9%. Cllr McCoubrey claimed Conwy received £256 per resident a year less than Denbighshire and £175 per head than Gwynedd.
Cllr McCoubrey said, “If we were funded at those levels year on year, we would not be in this situation.”
73% of Conwy’s budget comes from Welsh Government and 27% from council tax. Conwy’s total budget for 2023/24 is £198,413,000.
Councillors heard how Conwy now has the lowest reserves in Wales, but an exact figure wasn’t provided.
The authority has cut the budget of every service by 10%, except education and social services, which have taken 5% cuts,
Last year, council tax in Conwy increased by 3.95%.
