It looks like Greenwich Labour are breaking their promise to improve the level of support given to low income residents with Council Tax bills from this April.
A year ago Greenwich Conservatives put forward a fully costed proposal to lift up to 15,000 low-income residents out of Council Tax altogether, by increasing the support given to qualifying working-age residents in the Council Tax Support scheme to up to 100% of their bills, up from the current 85%.
Labour councillors voted this proposal down – as with most of our good ideas – and tride to claim they were intending to implement the change anyway, promising that it would come into effect in April 2019. I blogged on the dubious basis for this claim at the time here.
Either way, the promise was made. During that budget-setting meeting, then Council Leader Denise Hyland told me:
“The Fairness Commission has made a recommendation for that, and that is for an introduction in April 2019. So it’s already under way with the working party for social mobility – it’s already a recommendation that has been accepted.”
Cabinet instead recommending no change
But fast forward a year, and at their Cabinet meeting tonight, Labour councillors are set to make a recommendation to next week’s Full Council meeting that no change is made to Council Tax Support for the coming year. Continue reading Greenwich Labour set to break their promise on Council Tax Support
