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* * * News for 13th February 2003 * * *

All of Medway: 13th February 2003

Money Conservatives propose Council Tax rise of just 12½%

Conservatives keep Council Tax increase down without sacrificing services.

Despite the efforts of Medway's Labour group to force up Medway's Council Tax by more than a third, very careful budget-setting work by the Conservative administration has resulted in a proposed increase of just 12½%. Even that would not have been necessary if the government (who dictate the vast majority of local authority financing) had not deliberately siphoned off our money to pump it to other parts of the country.

Evidence now clearly shows that we in the south-east are being given no option but to subsidise other parts of Britain, most notably the north, as the graph below clearly shows. The national media have also realised this...

"Northern Councils to gain from new rules on funding" (Financial Times 9th July 2002)
"Tax on the South will prop up the North" (Daily Mail 16th November 2002)
This illustrates the percentage change to the fovernment grant for 2003/2004 by region, in ascending order of size of increase.

Kent is at the very bottom of the league table, followed by the south-east, London, eastern, south-west, north-east, Yorkshire & Humber, north-west, east midlands and finally west midlands right at the top with a 7·1% increase—almost double Kent's meagre 3·9%.

The average increase is 6%, so Kent has been awarded less than two-thirds of the national average.

Settlement 2003