East Cambridgeshire District Council has chosen to freeze its council tax for the tenth year in a row, amid a wave of authorities raising the tax.
At a full council meeting on 21 February, the authority announced that it has set a balanced budget for the next two years and agreed on the freeze.
According to the authority, East Cambridgeshire is the only district, county or unitary authority in the country not to have increased council tax. The freeze means an average Band D property will pay £142.14 to the district council, the same amount as 10 years ago.
This comes as new research from the County Councils Network found that three in four upper-tier local authorities are set to increase their council tax by the maximum amount this April due to rising inflation and large funding gaps.
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Anna Bailey, leader of East Cambridgeshire District Council, said: “We have always prided ourselves on being a forward-thinking council that is not afraid to explore new ideas when it comes to bringing in new funds and balancing our books.
“It’s inevitable that with the cost-of-living crisis this is challenging, but whereas many other local authorities are struggling to make ends meet now and relying on external borrowing and raising council tax, we are doing more than holding our own and we have time to come up with new options for generating income and saving money.
“Ten years of council tax freezes show we have a strong record of doing exactly this.”
Alongside East Cambridgeshire, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and Central Bedfordshire are among some authorities which have also chosen to freeze council tax for the next financial year.
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