Osborne to allow two per cent rise in council tax to pay for care

Chancellor George Osborne is to allow local authorities to raise council tax bills by two per cent a year to pay for social care costs and will announce the measure in this week’s Spending Review.

Local authorities can decide whether or not to impose the two per cent rise, which must be spent on social care. The charge comes on top of the annual two per cent council tax rise they already charge.

The Treasury is not issuing a formal statement on the plans until the Chancellor’s Comprehensive Spending Review announcement on 25 November.

In response, the chief executive of Care England which represents care providers and was among the organisations who wrote to the Chancellor demanding more money for social care in the Spending Review, has said the money will do little to plug the sector’s funding gap.

Chief executive of Care England Martin Green said: “George Osborne has failed the care sector with this move to allow councils to raise council tax by two per cent.

“There is no guarantee that this money will get to the frontline or directly to those who are providing care services.

“Unless it has to go directly to care providers it will get put into the structure not the service.

“The Chancellor and the Prime Minister should remember that nobody will remember the date when they balanced the budget but everyone will remember how they treated their parents when they had a stroke or their children with learning disabilities".

In their August letter to Osborne, care organisations highlighted the extra financial burden that the national living wage would put on care providers with local authorities paying inadequate rates for care home places and driving up providers' costs.