Agenda item

To consider the attached report.

The Assistant Director, Resources introduced the annual report on the fees and charges that the Council levies and what scope, if any, there was to increase particular charges.

The meeting noted that the Medium Term Financial Strategy had identified the need to find savings of £600,000, £300,000 in both 2020/21 and 2021/22, this was over and above the £2.5m (£1.7m General Fund) savings from the implementation of the people strategy which in itself was very challenging. Revenue Support Grant funding was set to be phased out in 2019/20 and although we had already had the settlement figures as part of the four year agreement this had still to be confirmed by the Government. At this stage there was no real information on funding levels from 2020/21 onwards except that it was expected that 75% of Business Rates income would be retained by the Local Authority sector. The funding split between upper and lower tier authorities had still to be confirmed and it was unclear whether any additional responsibilities would be placed on the sector as a result.

In reality, going forward the Council would have to fund all its General Fund services from the Council Tax, Retained Business Rates and Fees and Charges. If these resources were not sufficient the General Fund balance would need to make up the difference.

Under the Community and Partnership Services officers were looking to generally add on between 2.3 and 2.4% on charges.

Housing and Property Services were looking to add about 2.3%.

Development Control fee levels were controlled by Central Government and the levels of income were somewhat dependant on the economic climate and the number and size of planning applications. The Government introduced an increase in fees of 20% from January 2018 under the proviso that the additional income would be used for planning related services. An assessment would need to be made to ascertain how much income this amounted to and also it would need to be monitored going forward to ensure we comply with the requirements of the new fee regime.

The way Local Land Charges were recorded and dealt with was undergoing significant change. Longer term all information was to be held centrally by the Land Registry with local authorities having access to that system. There was a significant amount of work required by the Council before that could happen including data cleansing and migration to the Land Registry system. This council was expected to be part of the first phase due to be completed by December 2019. A full report on this was to be presented to Cabinet in due course and a review of fees and charges would be carried out for financial year 2020/21.

Cabinet have already looked at car parking services and their fee structure. The cost of collection of bulk waste was subject to an annual index linked increase in line with the Waste Management contract. The proposed fees are based on the increased cost of collection and included an admin fee.

Commercial and Regulatory Services were largely to be kept at their current levels.

There has been a big change in the level of charges for legal fees. Currently they were too low and they needed to be revisited. This had now been done and the fees updated. One proposal was to increase our charges as soon as members were happy we do so and not wait until the new financial year.

There were a number of fees and charges made by the Council which in some cases could be increased and in others could not or an increase could not be justifiable. The report sought member’s views on the level of fees and charges for 2019/20.

Councillor Janet Whitehouse asked about venue hire and asked if officers took any note of the usage of the facilities. She was told that they did look at the rates of use. She then asked what the figures in brackets in appendix 2 were. Mr Maddock said that he was not sure and would find out.

Councillor Lion asked about appendix 4 of the report and what were the scooter stores mentioned. He was told that they were for disabled scooters.

Councillor Bedford noticed the licence fee charges for HMOs; he noted that there were new definitions for HMO licences and this may generate more money; he asked if the licences were for a set period or were they indefinite. Mr Maddock said that he would check up on this.

Councillor Bedford noted that licensing fees could only cover our costs; could officers put in what fees we can change and what fees we could not. Mr Maddock said that officers reviewed these charges every year.

Councillor Bedford said that bulky household waste charge concessions were dependant on the pensionable age of the person. But pensionable age varied a lot nowadays and perhaps the wording needed changing to something like “in receipt of a state pension”.  This was agreed by the committee.

Councillor C Whitbread on reviewing the increased legal fees in appendix 7 of the report commented that some of them still looked quite light and asked who they were benchmarked with. Mr Maddock said that officers needed to do a through review and to look at other authorities and take into account Government thinking on this. Councillor Whitbread said that he was happy to put these increases through as soon as possible, hopefully from January 2019 and then look at them again once we had researched it.

Councillor Bedford asked if we could use the legal team for services for people outside our district. Councillor Lion said that this was being considered and report would be coming forward soon.

Councillor Patel asked about Building Control Fees. Mr Maddock that they had remained unchanged since 2011 and it was therefore recommended to increase fees by an average of 5%, but the exact fee structure was yet to be determined.

RESOLVED:

That the Committee reviewed and commented on the proposed level of fees and charges for 2019/20 and made recommendations as appropriate.