The Lead Member for Finance and Ascot introduced the report that sought amended approval of the Council Tax Base.

Cabinet were informed that the had originally approved the tax base of 68,817 in December 2019 but at the time as Lead Member he was concerned that some of the figures did not add up. It had subsequently come to light that the MOD properties in the calculation in Bray and White Waltham were being treated incorrectly. Also following contact with Bray Parish Council some houses in ‘The Fisheries’, which moved from Maidenhead to Bray Parish as part of the boundary change in May 2019 had not been included in their tax base. This had now been corrected and the new tax base was 68,691.

The Lead Member also highlighted agenda pack page 38 that showed applied discounts and informed that there were 270 empty properties listed and that empty properties would only receive two years exemption before having to pay 100% council tax.

Cllr Davey said that there were currently 30% of properties receiving single person discount of 25% and that if this discount was removed this could bring in about £6 million additional revenue.  He suggested that the discount be means tested as there were wealthy single residents in the Royal Borough who could afford to pay 100% council tax and thus the council would get additional revenue. 

In response Cabinet were informed that the discount was set my national government and could not be changed, even though councils had lobbied to have the ability to set a local level.  There were tracking systems in place to check for fraud and a risk based assessment was used that removed about 6% of discounts. 

Resolved unanimously: that Cabinet notes the report and:

i) Approves the Council Tax base for the whole of the Borough area, for 2020/21 at 68,691 as detailed in this report and appendices. This is an increase of 338 over the 2019/20 base, a 0.49% increase.

ii) Note a Council Tax collection rate of 99.5% for 2020/21.

iii) Note an estimated deficit on the Council Tax Collection Fund in 2019/20 of £142k of which the council’s share is £113k.