Keeping Council Tax rises down

All parties promise to keep Council Tax rises down, but read about what the Lib Dems are doing in Bournemouth so you can decide for yourself.

Overall the Council tax system itself is unfair and inefficient and Lib Dems are committed to scrapping it. However Lib Dem councillors in Bournemouth have to work with the system as it is now, and balance the Council's books.

Conservatives put up Council Tax by fifty per cent!

When the Conservatives were in power from 1999 to 2003, they put up Council Tax by a whopping fifty per cent. If they had held onto power they planned a further 16.5 per cent rise in just one year! The Conservatives also cut services, like street cleaning, and left other services with financial black holes.

Since 2003 the Lib Dems have managed to cut the rises from 16.5 per cent to 5.9 per cent in the first year, and then 4.6 per cent in the second year, and 3.4 per cent in 2006/7. This is despite Bournemouth getting the lowest Government grant of its kind in England.

Savings - and extra investment - under the Lib Dems

Praise

The Lib Dem led council has recently been awarded 4 out of 4 for "use of resources" by the independent Audit Commission.

Scrap unfair Council Tax, say Lib Dems

Council tax is unfair and hits retired people and those on fixed or low incomes particularly hard. It is also inefficient to collect. The Lib Dems have led the campaign to scrap the Council Tax and replace it with a fair system. Both Labour and the Conservatives don't have a plan to scrap the tax.

Revaluation beaten - for now

Under pressure from Lib Dems and other Council Tax campaigners the Government has dropped plans for Council Tax Revaluation. This would have seen towns like Bournemouth, where house prices have risen over the past 15 years, saddled with massive rises in Council Tax. After the victory on revaluation Lib Dems will keep up the pressure to scrap the tax completely.