Residents urged to have their say on council tax rise and budget plans

Senior councillors in Newport have urged city residents to have their say in a formal consultation on next year’s budget plans, including a proposed council tax rise.

Cllr Dimitri Batrouni, the city council leader, said Newport is growing more quickly than any other area of Wales, putting pressure on services for younger and older residents alike.

Billpayers could see council tax go up by 6.7% from April, working out at an extra £100 for those living in average Band D properties.

And the council has also included a range of savings measures in its draft budget proposals for 2025/26, including closing some libraries and shrinking its collection of community centres.

A public consultation on the proposals is now open and will run until February 5.

Cllr Emma Stowell-Corten urged residents to take part, warning that views aired elsewhere – such as on social media – wouldn’t end up being included in the formal feedback.

Cllr Deb Davies, the cabinet member for education and the deputy leader of Newport City Council, said the budget proposals include “difficult decisions” on spending but would protect funding for schools.

“We want residents to feel proud that they live in Newport,” she told cabinet colleagues at a meeting on Monday January 13.

Work to make residents feel “safe” and maintain services “comes at a cost”, she added.

Cllr Batrouni said most council tax payers in Newport lived in properties with lower banding.

A rise of 6.7% would work out at an extra £66 to £89 in council tax a year for those residents.

The leader also said other budget proposals “prove we are a listening council”.

He said these include more grass cutting and setting up a “hit squad” for extra street cleaning.

Opposition councillors have criticised the council’s proposals to increase council tax while making cuts to some services, however.

The leader of the Conservative group, Cllr Matthew Evans, said he was “fed up of seeing payments go up while service provision goes down, from bin collections to streetlights – they even want to reduce libraries”.

Speaking at the council meeting, Cllr Batrouni accepted Newport was set to receive the highest increase in annual funding from the Welsh Government – which accounts for around three-quarters of the local authority’s income.

But he argued that any increase simply reflected the city’s rapid growth, which had caused schools and social services departments to “take the strain”.

The extra government funding was “responding to a real need across this city”, he added, before making an appeal to Newport’s residents to take part in the formal consultation.

“We urge them to get involved and have their voices heard,” he said. “We do want to know what people think.”

To take part in the consultation on the draft budget proposals, visit the Newport City Council website at https://www.newport.gov.uk/our-council/have-your-say/open-consultations