Cheshire East residents look set to see an increase of 4.43% in the amount they pay towards policing, writes Belinda Ryan.
If the increase suggested by Police and Crime Commissioner John Dwyer (pictured) is ratified by the police and crime panel on Friday (February 4) that will mean an extra £10 a year on the police precept for a band D council tax payer across the county.
In a letter to the panel, which is responsible for scrutinising the PCC’s precept and police and crime plan, Mr Dwyer said: “This is an increase of around 83p per month, which represents an additional 4.4 per cent.
“This is lower than the current rate of inflation, which at 5.4 per cent for CPI (consumer prices index), is the highest since official records began in January 1997.”
Altogether, 3,738 local people responded to the PCC’s budget consultation which outlined his proposal and 70% supported the increase of up to £10 a year.
Mr Dwyer states in the letter: “I am therefore proposing an increase of £10 per annum (based on band D) to go towards funding my Police and Crime Plan priorities including improved 999 and 101 response call times, funding to make Cheshire’s roads safer for everyone, tackling economic, cyber and digital crime and action to reduce anti-social behaviour and repeat re-offending.
“This budget will ensure that the chief constable has the resources needed to help Cheshire residents feel safe.
“This will enable improvements to be made, to take on increasingly complex demands, and meet the priorities I set out in my Police and Crime Plan following consultation with the residents of Cheshire.”
Meanwhile, Cheshire East Council is expected to raise its share (precept) of the council tax by 2.99% when its budget is decided at full council on February 24.
One per cent of that increase goes towards adult social care.
This will mean a rise of £47.21 for a Band D property, taking it to £1,626.24 a year.
Cheshire Fire Authority is expected to raise its precept by 1.99%, which will add an extra £1.61 per year to a Band D bill, taking its share to £82.48.
Its budget meeting takes place on February 9.
Taken together, this means a Band D council tax payer can expect to pay an extra £58.82 in council tax for 2022/23.
This does not include the town and parish council precepts which vary in each locality.
It is ring fenced to provide extra staff not a wage increase, personally I would like to see better community training for staff as times have moved on and drug use is rife as is anti social behaviour
With the rising cost of living, this is outrageous, the money that each area my council tax covers and the service they provide does not represent value for money.
I think they need to look at how much the executives of each area are paid, and not penalize the hard working staff when asked to make cutbacks to meet any shortfall.
He spent over £60k to do the survey and the results are as far as I am aware have not been published. It was obvious from the start he would go for the maximum increase – hope none of the extra income is to be used for the PCC’s expensive unit costing around £700k pa.
Please note he says 70% supported an increase of UPTO £10 per year – this means that some would have said £3, £5, £7 choose an amount.
Do we need the PCC?