A REVISED council tax proposal is due to be confirmed by senior councillors at an upcoming meeting.
The figure, which will be an increase on the amount residents had to pay last year, has been revised down from the uplift the council had previously based its budget planning on and has to be formally agreed as a proposal by cabinet members.
Members of Torfaen Borough Council’s Labour cabinet are also being advised that over the next four years the council faces a £10.2 million shortfall in funding based on assumptions finance chiefs have made on future funding, levels of demand and increased costs such as pay.
The council’s medium-term financial plan highlights the funding gap and outlines, in broad terms, steps the authority will take to try and address and review costs pressures.
The cabinet will be updated on the medium-term plan at its Tuesday, February 24 meeting, at the Civic Centre in Pontypool, when it will also be asked to agree its final budget proposals for the 2026/27 financial year.
That includes the revised 3.95 per cent council tax increase which is lower than the 4.95 per cent figure this year’s budget planning had been based on.
That will mean the borough council element of the council tax bill, for a typical band D home, will be £1,691.60, an increase of £64.28 on last year or an extra £1.24 a week though police and community council precepts still have to be added to give the final amount residents must pay.
A budget deal between the Labour Welsh Government and Plaid Cymru in the Senedd resulted in extra funding for local government, above that allocated in the provisional Welsh budget announced before Christmas, which provided a 4.7 per cent increase in funding for Torfaen worth an extra £9.3m.
The council has to agree a balanced budget, meaning all its outgoings are matched by incoming income, and the council tax rise forms part of the total £264m budget the cabinet will put before the full council for approval on March 3. As Labour has a comfortable majority on the council it is expected the budget will be passed.
The cabinet has already agreed to to invest in services supporting young people impacted by domestic violence, to take on apprentices, support for youngsters who aren’t in education or training and extra funding to help schools support pupils with Additional Learning Needs as a result of the additional money it has received since its original budget planning.
It is proposing this year’s budget puts aside £2.3m for estimated pay inflation, with pay for the vast majority of council staff negotiated nationally, and a further £4.5m for schools, which also covers them for pay inflation. Part of the extra funding for schools will also meet costs for the current financial year.
A £600,000 contingency fund if pay awards exceed the amounts budgeted for will also be created while £700,000 will be used to address the impact of increases in the Real Living Wage on what the council pays staff who earn slightly more than that. There is also funding to recognise the impact of an increase in the Real Living Wage on social care providers.
The budget also provides an additional £1.6m to maintain adult social care services at existing levels of demand of around 952 clients and funding for a second year of a two-year plan to reduce the cost of children’s care placements.