The background to the issue is
The Government introduced a council tax benefit cut of 20% on those receiving 100% council tax benefit.
This would have meant around £200 a year hit on around 8000 claimants.
The Labour Group proposed another way to gain finance without cuts or increasing council tax.
The now agreed proposal would mean only a 7% cut in benefit, which is around £70 a year per claimant.
In addition a new Discretionary Housing Payment Scheme with approx. £880,000 of funding which will help individual cases of financial hardship.
An all-party task group to be formed to investigate the potential of using current legislation to help residents who are in need of help as a consequence of the austerity measures and Welfare reform impacts.
Best Wishes
Jim Allan
Leader of the Labour Group
Labour Councillor for Camperdown Ward, North Tyneside Council
Tel 07909234752
Press Release
Labour Pressure gets Mayor to rethink
The Labour Group have shown the Mayor and her Cabinet that there are other ways
to help our most vulnerable in North Tyneside - Jim Allan
The Labour group which has 43 representatives on the council have managed to
convince the Mayor that there are other ways that can be introduced to help those
suffering as a consequence of benefit reforms. Labour asked the Cabinet to go back
and take the potential impact of the welfare reforms on our most vulnerable people of
working age, and consider other options before coming back to Council for a final
decision.
The Cabinet received a further report from Officers that offers another option which
greatly reduces the financial burden of the Coalition Government’s welfare reforms
and also creates a new fund “Discretionary Housing Payments” which will help with
individual cases of hardship as a consequence of welfare reform
Deputy Labour group leader Norma Redfearn said
‘We’re were concerned that the Elected Mayor and her Cabinet did not have any
proposals to put to council and were leaving it to the rest of council to agree the
management of the benefit changes. We voiced our concerns that the Mayor had not
demonstrated clear leadership on a matter that was being introduced by the
Coalition Government and was leaving it to other councillors to do the job for her. It
was the view of our Group that there were clearly a number of options that were
available and could be brought forward as a softer option to minimise the impact of
the benefit cuts.
As a result of the representations made by Labour Councillors, at a reconvened
meeting of the council last night the council agreed to the new Option4 which clearly
shows that the Labour Group were right in making their case to do everything that
was possible to reduce the burden of these cuts.
For further info
Jim Allan
Tel 07909234752
