Issue - meetings

The Assembly received a report from the Cabinet Member for Finance setting out proposals to establish a revised Local Council Tax Support Scheme (LCTSS) from April 2015.

The Cabinet Member explained that the LCTSS was introduced from April 2013 following the abolition of Council Tax benefit as a consequence of the Welfare Act 2012.  Support through the local scheme attracted central funding by way of a fixed two year grant, based on prevailing expenditure set in 2012/13 but with a factored reduction of 10%.  The existing local scheme had included and replicated annual uprating of social security rates for housing benefit and it was proposed that this would continue in 2015/16.  In addition, the new scheme would continue to include many of the features of the existing scheme including those discretionary elements as detailed in the report.

The proposed changes to the current scheme were summarised as:

·  Support for working age recipients would be capped at 75% as opposed to 85% under the current scheme meaning that, as a minimum, recipients would need to make a 25% contribution of their Council Tax charge;

·  Removal of the second Adult rebate scheme as an alternative award of support;

·  Removal of backdated claims for working age residents;

·  Reducing the maximum capital threshold for working age residents for CTSS eligibility from £16,000 to £6,000.

The Cabinet Member explained that as there were proposed changes to the existing LCTSS an extensive consultation exercise was carried out.  Disappointingly, of the 16,000 residents who were written to only 147 responses were received and there was a relatively low turnout at two public meetings.  A full report on the consultation was appended to the report together with a detailed equalities impact assessment that was undertaken in the light of the public consultation.  

It was noted that the Public Accounts and Audit Select Committee had also considered the changes to the scheme as part of the budget savings exercise.  The Committee had supported the proposals subject to a review as to whether any additional funds could be made available to top up the Discretionary Housing Payments scheme in order to provide support to those most vulnerable sections of the community.  The Cabinet Member confirmed that some funding had been identified which would act as a financial safety net and this would be closely monitored, as would the collection rates which had proved higher than was expected.

In response to the report Councillor Gill asked the Cabinet Member to clarify:

(a)  The criteria that would be applied to the use of the discretionary monies and the estimated cost of administering the scheme; and

(b)  How the changes would affect the most vulnerable, also bearing in mind a possible Council Tax increase in the coming year.

The Cabinet Member explained the approach that would be adopted, including a close alignment to the discretionary housing support policy criteria but added that the amount of discretionary funding that would be available would be limited and therefore it was important to ensure that the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 42