Council Tax Benefit Changes 2013

How many people know about the change in the way Council Tax is going to be paid from April 2013?

From April 2013 Council Tax Benefit (C.T.B.) will be re-named Council Tax Support and payments will become the responsibility of the local authority. The Council Tax budget will also be cut by around 10% and will be paid from a “pot” system rather than a general budget fund. This means that the local authority have to take into account every person who is eligible for a Council Tax Support (C.T.S.) payment and decide how much a person may receive in benefit.

Excluded from this are people of pension age and over.

For example a local council which has a C.T.S. budget of say, £10 million has to first pay the people of pension age and over, which may come to £2 million leaving only £8 million left for everyone else applying for Council tax benefit.
Before April 2013 it was irrelevant how many people applied for the C.T.B. as the money was paid on an individual basis regardless of how many other people had applied for the benefit.  Not any more, it will depend on how many people in a local authority apply for the C.T.P. benefit on how much will be paid to each individual or family.   

If the Council reduces the amount of benefit paid the main bulk of people that are going to be affected by this change are those of a working age. If you currently fall into the working age bracket the amount of help you receive under the Council Tax Support scheme would be less than you currently receive on the current Council Tax Benefit scheme. 

Strangely, the C.T.S. scheme has been decided upon by a collection of Local Authorities in the Essex area rather than being set nationally by Central Government.   A major change is that the local authority C.T.S. funding is being reduced by 10% by Central Government. 

I believe the Government has passed the responsibility on to local authorities so the Government can wash their hands of the reduction and blame the local authorities for it and the way they are implementing the scheme. Of course the local authority will have to find the money from their own budget to run the new C.T.S.  scheme putting more financial pressure on the council taxpayer.

It appears, at the moment, that most people will have their benefit cut and the public will begin to see how the Government’s austerity cuts are beginning to affect them.

“We are all in it together” is the Prime Minister’s mantra. Maybe some one should tell Prince Harry, other members and associates of the Royal Family of that and curb their excesses.

McTaggart