Guidance

Local council tax support grant: distribution methodology note 2021 to 2022

Updated 12 August 2022

Applies to England

£670 million LCTS grant distribution methodology note (indicative allocations 2021-22)^{[footnote 1]}

1. Calculate the mean average of working-age local council tax support (LCTS) claimants in published statistics for Q1 & Q2 in 2020-21 in the billing authority area.

Source: LCTS live table (4th one down): ‘Working Age’ tab only^{[footnote 2]}

2. Calculate the ratio of the average bill per dwelling in the billing authority’s area in 2020-21 to the average bill per dwelling in England in 2020-21 (£1,385.15) for billing authorities.

Source: Council tax per dwelling live table^{[footnote 3]}

3. Multiply the answer in step 1 with the answer in step 2 for each billing authority. Divide this answer by the sum of this calculation for all billing authorities. This gives the proportionate initial share of funding at billing authority level (summing to 1 for all billing authorities).

4. Multiply the proportion provided at step 3 by £670 million to get initial aggregate billing authority area allocations. These then need to be apportioned between billing and major precepting authorities in the area.

5. To apportion, calculate each authority in the billing authority area’s share of the aggregate council tax requirement (‘CTR’) in the area for 2020-21^{[footnote 4]}. Use these proportions to distribute the billing authority level allocations from step 4 between each authority in the billing authority’s area. Precepting authorities’ final allocations are the sum of each allocation from their relevant billing authorities.

Source: CTR table, table 9.

6. The previous steps provide allocations at 2020-21 local authority geographies. This final step is only applicable for local authority restructures taking effect in 2021-22 and are as follows:

a. For the transfer of the fire functions of the Isle of Wight Council, and the Hampshire Fire and Rescue Authority (‘the old FRA’), to the new Hampshire and Isle of Wight Fire and Rescue authority (‘the new FRA’): using the same methodology as that for the proposed Alternative Notional Amounts (‘ANA’) for council tax agreed with the authorities concerned. This means that the Isle of Wight Council’s allocation = (IoW council ANA / IoW council band D charge for 2020-21) * IoW council allocation based on 2020-21 geographies. The difference between IoW’s council’s allocation based on 2020-21 geographies less its adjusted allocation based on 2021-22 geographies, is allocated to the new FRA along with the old FRA’s allocation.

b. For North and West Northamptonshire unitary authorities: each authority is given its respective shire district allocations and Northamptonshire County Council’s allocation is split between the two on the basis of each new authority’s share of the total tax base for the two new authorities, i.e. the sum of Northamptonshire’s shire district tax bases^{[footnote 5]}.

1. Final allocations may be subject to minor revisions, for example to reflect changes in published statistics. They will also be subject to a grant payment rounding methodology to the nearest £1. ↩

2. Average of columns for Q1 & Q2 for 2020-21 i.e. columns AC and AE on tab ‘Working Age’. ↩

3. Tab ‘Average per Dwelling’ column AL for 2020-21. ↩

4. Using columns V & CA of ‘Data’ tab of CTR table 9, average council tax values are rounded to 2 decimal places before proportions of the total of these for the billing and precepting authorities in an area are calculated. ↩

5. Column T of ‘Data’ tab of CTR table 9. (Split is approx. 44.41% North / 55.59% West). ↩