Agenda item

To consider the report of the Chief Finance Officer (copy enclosed).

The Committee considered the report of the Chief Finance Officer (CFO) providing an update on the recently published government consultation regarding the future approach to funding councils in England (the Fair Funding Review 2.0; A consultation on the government’s proposed approach to local authority funding reform through Local Government Finance Settlement from 2026 – 27).

The report set out they key aspects of the consultation document which was published on 20 June 2025 and required responses by 15 August 2025. Appendix 1 to the report provided a summary of the consultation questions and the Council’s proposed response to each question. The report set out the key points in each section and provided detailed information regarding:

·                Background detail on the Settlement Funding Assessment calculation

·                Council tax – ‘band D’ charge verses ‘yield’

·                Fees and charges

·                Possible responses and submitting the response

The CFO took Members through the report and the proposed consultation responses. He suggested that the final consultation response be agreed with the Committee via email.

A lengthy debate ensued, during which Members raised a number of questions, and the following information was provided:

·                Question 10 – the CFO explained that the general approach of equalising the benefit available from council tax made sense, but this was already being achieved through top-up and tariff amounts. The principle was reasonable but the mechanism in his opinion was unnecessary, this was why the response was neither agree nor disagree.

·                Wages and earnings – the Government was looking to take account of the different levels of wages across the country. At this stage if was difficult to say how it would work, the measures they would use and how they would be applied.

·                Concern was raised regarding not topping up the inflationary increases.

In response the CFO advised that he would update the appendix and share this with Members the week prior to submission. Sign off would not be necessary at that point, although if Members could indicate if they agreed or disagreed that would be helpful.

It was agreed that as she was a local Member of Parliament, Officers would share any information about the modelled impact of proposals on the Council with the Shadow Secretary of State for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Rt Hon Priti Patel).

The Chairperson moved the recommendations set out in the report. This was duly seconded and agreed.

RESOLVED

(i)             That the Committee discussed the key points of the consultation, and the outline provided of proposed responses to come from Maldon District Council (MDC);

(ii)            That the proposed approach (set out below) to finalise the Council’s response to the Fair Funding Review 2.0 consultation is approved, noting the deadline for submissions is 15 August.

(a)           that MDC submits responses aligned to other sectoral responses that may be expected in due course from the bodies such as the District Council Network, the Local Government Association, and other local Councils in Essex for examples.

(b)           that the proposed draft response to all questions is shared with the members of the Strategy and Resources Committee before submission electronically, on the basis that the subject matter is already largely confirmed and so in-person discussion will not be necessary.