Decision details
Council Tax CoVid-19 Hardship Fund
Decision Maker: Head of Revenues and Benefits Shared Service
Decision status: Recommendations Approved
Is Key decision?: No
Is subject to call in?: No
Decision:
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 the 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.
Alternative options considered:
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.
Contact: Sheila Coburn Email: sheila.coburn@midkent.gov.uk.
Publication date: 09/04/2020
Date of decision: 02/04/2020