Precept funding

Around January of each year, councillors come together to consider what funding is required to pay for the provision of council services proposed to be undertaken in the forthcoming year. The council will consider the expenditure allocation for these services against the number of Council Tax payers within the village (the Council Tax Base) who will pay the precept.

This is drawn up into an annual budget which you can find here, which forms the basis of a ‘precept demand’. The council must notify WMDC of its precept demand as a total figure together with its agreed budget by the end of february each year. The precept will be collected as part of the Council Tax charged by WMDC each year.

Upon examining the budget you will see reference to ‘s.137’ towards the bottom. This refers to s.137 of Local Government Act 1972 – under this section expenditure is included here if there is no specific legal act that the expenditure (which is in the interests of or for the direct benefit of Crofton or any part of it, or some or all of the residents of Crofton) can be allocated against. You can also track s.137 expenditure through the monthly payment receipt schedules which show how the council work within its budget month-to-month.

You can find more information on how the precept is calculated here.