Council tax and rents for people in Reading are set to increase this year as the council faces ‘extraordinary pressures’.
At the start of each year, local authorities begin planning for budgets for the next financial year, running from April 2025 to March 2026.
Darren Carter, the chief finance officer for Reading Borough Council has devised a draft budget for 2025/26 which assumes a 4.99 per cent council tax increase.
Of that, 2.99 per cent council tax increase, plus two per cent ringfenced to pay for adult social care.
Furthermore, rents for council housing tenants are set to increase by 2.7 per cent.
Speaking about the challenges the council faces, Liz Terry (Labour, Coley), the council leader said: “I think it’s important that the national context and the areas we’ve seen overspends are noted, these are about demand pressures, they’re not about mismanagement or not budgeting properly.
“They are things which are pressures in the system. I’ve been at a number of meetings with council leaders across the political divide, and in every conversation I have, the areas we spoke about in particular, adult social care, children’s services and housing are the ones that everybody is experiencing these extraordinary pressures in demand and cost increases.
“It isn’t a club I’m in any way comfortable to be in, and while the council’s position has evidently worsened in terms of those pressures, we’re not in the position of needing exceptional financial support yet, unlike some authorities not very far away from us I’m sorry to say.
“Nonetheless action needs to be taken to close that gap, and we have to set a legal balanced budget, and I’m determined we will find a way to do that, notwithstanding these pressures.”
Cllr Terry made her speech about the proposed budget for 2025/26 at the policy committee meeting on December 18, 2024.
The council is now engaging in a consultation on its draft budget.
The consultation asks whether residents are comfortable with the proposed 4.99 per cent council tax increase to meet the pressures it faces.
It also asks where people which areas they are most and least comfortable with the council reducing spending on, or increasing income from, with the draft budget for 2025/26 being shown:
Family Hubs – £2.847 million
Home to school transport – £3.619 million
Theatres – £0.353 million
Reading Town Hall and Museum -£0.929 million
Facilities in parks and open spaces – £0.203 million
Voluntary sector funding – £8.173 million
Street cleaning – £1.920 million
Street lighting – £1.110 million
Homelessness prevention – £2.258 million
Income from fees and charges – income of £50.751 million
The consultation mentions that not all of its capital projects are fully funded, asking people which projects could be stopped or scaled back.
The most expensive of the 21 projects are the highways infrastructure programme of £5.062 million and £3.216 million of council funding for The Hexagon Theatre upgrade.
Finally, it asks people whether they support the 2.7 per cent increase to council house rents.
You can take part in the consultation on the Go Vocal website.
The survey closes on Thursday, January 16.
