One of the roles of Surrey Heath Borough Council (SHBC) is to collect Council Tax. But they don’t keep it all, in fact they only keep 11%.  When you consider that collecting Council Tax itself costs money, SHBC get to keep even less.   In 2021-22, £263,000 was allocated for the costs of collecting Council Tax, more than 2% of the SHBC Budget.

So what does SHBC do with the money it is left with, and what happens to the other 89%?

The diagram below may help:

It shows how your Council Tax bill of £2,071, for a Band D house in Frimley Green, breaks down. These are the figures for 2021-22; I will update for 2022-23 when the figures are available.

Of the £39.83 a week, SHBC keep £4.28. The vast majority goes to Surrey County Council (SCC). Surrey Children’s Services, for example, costs you £5.87 a week, 37% more than the total that SHBC keep.

With the £4.38 a week, SHBC has to collect our bins, clean our streets, look after our parks, manage planning applications, enforce planning decisions, clear fly-tipping, manage affordable and social housing, do food safety inspections, run trading standards, fund Citizens Advice Bureau, hold elections, catch stay dogs, and more.

For 2022-23 I’ll provide a more detailed breakdown of how your Council Tax is allocated to these services.

Any questions or comments welcome: Contact me.

Stuart Black, January 2022.