A thump on the doormat. Another brown envelope. “Please recycle”, it screams. Must be from the Council. Ah yes, the annual Council Tax demand. Unchanged from last year, thank God, but still an eye watering £27 per week for a band D property. The occupants of our grand houses, Horsington Manor, the Grange and Cheriton House pay £55 a week.
Local government finance is a labyrinth. During the run up to the elections we will try and unravel some of it for you in an attempt to see where our money went, and if any was wasted.
The lions share –nearly 70% of your council tax goes to Somerset County Council
11.4% goes to the police
10.2% to South Somerset District Council
4.9% to the Fire and Rescue service
4% to town and parish councils
Horsington raises some £588,000 in council tax. It will get £9,500 back for the parish council budget.(1.6%)
North Cheriton puts over £144,000 into the kitty, and the parish gets £2,512 back (1.7%)
This is not the entire picture. Both the district and county council get the bulk of their income from central government, which is still your money.
The district council gets £57.2 million from the government, The county council £153.3 million.
We will look at each of these bodies in turn in future posts to see how they spend it.