Council tax will rise by five per cent and council tenant rents by seven per cent under new budget plans by Bristol City Council. But proposed cuts to parks, libraries and the council tax reduction scheme, which helps the poorest families, have been shelved following a backlash.
An updated budget, to be recommended by Labour mayor Marvin Rees’s cabinet on Tuesday, January 24, also includes new proposals to increase the cost of garden waste collections from £32 to £50 a year and charging second-home owners full council tax. The proposals will then be put before full council next month. The council tax hike, comprising the maximum allowed 2.99 per cent for general services and two per cent for adult social care, means a £94.87 increase for band D properties and excludes smaller precepts from the police and fire authorities.
Despite the extra income, the local authority still faces a £20.3million budget gap in 2023/24, going up to £40.2million in four years, although the cabinet papers say the worse-case scenario by 2027/28 is a £125million blackhole. The council has proposed savings totalling £16.2million in the 12 months from April and £30.2million overall.
Read more: Bristol parks face 'spiral of decline' in city council budget cuts
This has come down from the £45.7million of suggested cutbacks in its original draft budget that the council recently consulted on, which included £1.5million less for parks, a £1.4million cut for libraries and £3million savings on the council tax reduction scheme. All three have been reversed following public feedback and with some more money from the government to help the worst-off.
A further £8.8million will be used from reserves over the next three years to balance the books. Mr Rees said: ‘More than a decade of government austerity has already cut council budgets to the bone, but despite the challenges, we have found a way to continue to protect frontline services.
“Since putting the budget out to consultation, we have adjusted our proposals to better reflect our, and fellow Bristolians’, priorities. The consultation showed that people felt particularly strongly about the proposed savings for parks and libraries.
“Central Library will remain in its current home and we will not move ahead with the other aspects of those savings proposals. Instead, we will work with the city to find ways to sustainably run these departments with less government funding in the long term.
“This budget protects funding for all of our 22 children’s centres and all of our 27 libraries. We remain the only core city to maintain the 100 per cent reduction band of the council tax reduction scheme.
“Likewise, the Local Crisis Prevention Fund – which provides cash grants to the worst-off for emergencies – is unchanged for 2023/24.” He said every penny of the seven per cent rise in council rents to £90.76 a week would be spent on repairs and improvements to tenants’ homes.
“This includes our sprinkler installation scheme, communal fire alarms and the ‘waking watch’ for homes with Expanded Polystyrene cladding,” the city’s mayor said. “With this rent rise, our programme for improving council homes remains on track, with £80million for making them more energy efficient, saving tenants money on their heating bills, our £8.7million fund to improve communal areas and a £12.5million bathroom replacement scheme.”
He said the rent increase would be absorbed for around two-thirds of tenants by the local housing allowance, while others should see the rise offset through the council tax reduction scheme. Tory group leader Cllr Mark Weston said: “We welcome the removal of the libraries and parks spending from the savings plan as these will always be key Conservative priorities when considering what ought to be core council competences.
“Overall, one cannot help but think that the authority’s finances would be in a much better position had the mayor not frittered away so much money on hopeless commercial ventures – Bristol Energy – and the rather grotesque cost of rebuilding the Bristol Beacon.” A report to next week’s meeting said: “The medium-term financial outlook is the most severe we have known for many years and the council continues to manage a challenging financial environment.
“The position is unprecedented with national and international factors largely beyond the council’s control, including inflation and pay-related cost increases, rapidly rising energy costs and broader demand pressures and costs in both adults’ and children’s social care. The identification and achievement of significant savings is essential to live within our means and to shield us from the immediate impact of government cuts in 2025/26 and beyond.
“The cumulative impact of our saving proposals are likely to have a disproportionate impact on people living in poverty/low-income families, and equalities groups particularly on the basis of age and disability. We will aim to mitigate this disproportionate impact as possible by prioritising and retaining statutory and targeted services which most benefit vulnerable groups.”
The proposed general fund revenue budget totals £483.5million, up by £58.5million on this year. Full council will set the budget on February 21.
Read next:
Central library could relocate to save Bristol City Council millions
Thousands of Bristol's poorest families could be forced to pay council tax for first time in years
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