Another Reform-run local authority admits it may raise council tax

A Reform UK-run council where the party sought to pilot drastic cost-cutting plans is going to have to raise council tax, a cabinet member has admitted.

- Ben Quinn

Services at Kent county council were already “down to the bare bones”, said Reform’s cabinet member for adult social care, Diane Morton. It makes Kent the latest local authority controlled by Nigel Farage’s party to signal its intention to raise council tax.

“We've got more demand than ever before and it’s growing,” Morton told the Financial Times. “We just want more money.”

Morton said she believed the local authority would raise council tax by 5% - the maximum permitted - as councils try to honour their legal duty to make sure spending adds up before budgets are set for next year.

Reform’s leader of West Northamptonshire council said last month that council tax was “highly likely” to go up next year.

The Reform leader of Durham county council has also said that without additional funding from central government it will have to make “stark choices between council tax increases and cuts to vital local services”.