MAIDSTONE BOROUGH COUNCIL
RECORD OF DECISION OF THE Head of Revenues and Benefits Shared Service
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Decision Made: |
02 April 2020 |
Council Tax CoVid-19 Hardship Fund
Decision Made
That the Council exercises its
discretionary powers under s13A(1)(c) of the Local Government Finance Act 1992
to provide all recipients of working age Council Tax support (CTS) during the
financial year 2020-21 with a further reduction in their annual Council Tax
bill of up to £150; and
That in line with the Council Tax Support Scheme approved by Council on the 18
December 2019, the calculation of Council Tax Support for 2020-21 is amended to
reflect the increase to the Universal Credit (UC) standard allowance and
Working Tax Credit (WTC) basic element for one year from 6 April 2020, with the
changes to be mirrored in the needs assessment (applicable amount) and income
disregards for the purpose of calculating LCTS.
Reasons for Decision
As part of its response to
COVID-19, the Government announced in the Budget on 11 March that it would
provide local authorities in England with £500m of new grant funding to support
economically vulnerable people and households in their local area.
The Government’s strong expectation is that billing authorities will provide
all recipients of working age Local Council Tax Support (‘LCTS’) during the
financial year 2020-21 with a further reduction in their annual Council Tax
bill of £150, using their discretionary powers to reduce the liability of
Council Tax payers outside of their formal LCTS scheme design. This is set out
by MHCLG in the Covid-10 hardship fund 2020-21 guidance.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/council-tax-covid-19-hardship-fund-2020-to-2021-guidance
In addition, a number of changes were announced to the welfare system including
an increase to the Universal Credit (UC) standard allowance and Working Tax
Credit (WTC) basic element for one year from 6 April 2020. Due to the way that
these benefits interact with the calculation of CTS, a corresponding change is
required within the CTS scheme to ensure that the change is not treated as
additional income reducing entitlement to CTS and negating assistance to
applicants.
Alternatives considered and why rejected
Whilst introduction of the
changes is at the discretion of the Council and the Council could decide not to
make the changes proposed by Government, this would be to the detriment of
low-income working age households in receipt of CTS.
The Council could look to distribute the funding to low-income families using a
different criteria but that would be out of step with the approach proposed by
Government and being adopted by neighbouring Councils.
Details of the Committee
The decision has been taken in line with delegations to the Head of Revenues and Benefits in the Council’s Constitution at Part 2, 2.3.14, paragraph 13:
The administration, collection and recovery of non-domestic rates and Council Tax, including determining any discretionary items in connection with local taxation or national non-domestic rates The Chairman and Vice-Chairman of Policy and Resources Committee have been consulted on this.