Councillors on Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority agreed to nearly 2% rise in fire element of council tax (from April 2022) for residents in Wirral, Liverpool, St Helens, Knowsley and Sefton

Councillors on Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority agreed to nearly 2% rise in fire element of council tax (from April 2022) for residents in Wirral, Liverpool, St Helens, Knowsley and Sefton

Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority 24th Februrary 2022

Councillors on Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority agreed to nearly 2% rise in fire element of council tax (from April 2022) for residents in Wirral, Liverpool, St Helens, Knowsley and Sefton

                                                             

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Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority (Budget) 24th February 2022 Part 1 of 2

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Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority (Budget) 24th February 2022 Part 2 of 2

Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority (Budget) 24th February 2022 Left to Right Phil Garrigan (Chief Fire Officer (Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service) and Chief Executive (Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority)), Councillor Leslie T Byrom (Chair, Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority), Ria Groves (Monitoring Officer (Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority)) and Shauna Healey (Democratic Services Manager (Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service))
Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority (Budget) 24th February 2022 Left to Right Phil Garrigan (Chief Fire Officer (Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service) and Chief Executive (Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority)), Councillor Leslie T Byrom (Chair, Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority), Ria Groves (Monitoring Officer (Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority)) and Shauna Healey (Democratic Services Manager (Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service))

By John Brace (Editor)

First publication date: Friday 25th February 2022, 2:44 (GMT).

Councillors on the Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority agreed its 2022/23 Budget at a public meeting (which you can watch above) at Merseyside Fire and Rescue Headquarters on Thursday 24th February 2022. The Budget was proposed by the majority Labour Group (who hold 14 of the 18 councillor seats) but also received support from the opposition councillors (Conservative and Liberal Democrat).

The agreed Budget included a council tax rise in the fire element of council tax for residents in Wirral, Liverpoool, St Helens, Knowsley and Sefton (I’ll declare an interest as the person liable in this household for council tax). The rise for each band (you can see the impact on each band in the table below) is either 1.96% or 1.97% (which is below the 2% threshold that would trigger a referendum). The council tax rise for Merseyside households will come into effect on 1st April 2022.

2022/23Property BandIncrease
££%
55.74A1.071.96
65.03B1.251.96
74.32C1.431.96
83.61D1.611.96
102.19E1.971.97
120.77F2.331.97
139.35G2.681.96
167.22H3.221.96

During the meeting, the Chair (Councillor Byrom) said, “We’ve been critical of the national project Airwave replacement ESMCP [Emergency Services Mobile Communications Programme] and so forth, which they’re just dragging out and dragging out and these are vital to us.”

Airwave is the name for the radio communication system (used mainly (but not exclusively) by police, fire and ambulance services in England, Scotland and Wales) which was due to be replaced by the Emergency Services Network in December 2019, however latest predictions are now that the switchover will not be complete until 2026 with a National Audit Office report in 2019 concluding that “the Home Office’s management of this critical programme has represented poor value for money”.

Councillor Andrew Makinson (Liberal Democrat Opposition Spokesperson) asked during the meeting, “There’s just one item on the Capital Programme I’d like to query, that’s the £1.25 million refurb at Bromborough when the Asset Management Plan says we’re considering replacing it. Is there a particular reason for urgency in this refurbishment that means it couldn’t be scheduled until after that review or is there a way that the review into Bromborough and Heswall could be brought forward just to ensure that we’re obtaining value for money here?”

Chief Fire Officer Phil Garrigan replied, “Chair, I’ll pick that one up. Members will recall when we’ve been setting the IRMP [Integrated Risk Management Plan] for 2021-2024, we did consider whether we would look at the proposal to merge Heswall [fire station] and Bromborough [fire station] and find an alternative site in proximity to them near the M53 junction and we’ve got the points that were raised about capital expenditure and so on and so forth because to get that wrong would mean we had less firefighters across Merseyside.

So on the basis of the land not being available in the long-term anyway, that did not become a viable option for us. We then should take a look at the arrangements at Heswall. Heswall has had a little bit of a refurbishment” … ”we’re also very cognisant of the Wirral [Local] Plan and as a result of taking a look at the Wirral Plan there’s a significant amount of property being built in and around Bromborough aligned to what I would describe as the industrial estate in proximity there and there’s potential for up to 5,000 new properties in that particular area.”

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Author: John Brace

New media journalist from Birkenhead, England who writes about Wirral Council. Published and promoted by John Brace, 134 Boundary Road, Bidston, CH43 7PH. Printed by UK Webhosting Ltd t/a Tsohost, 113-114 Buckingham Avenue, Slough, Berkshire, England, SL1 4PF.

7 thoughts on “Councillors on Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority agreed to nearly 2% rise in fire element of council tax (from April 2022) for residents in Wirral, Liverpool, St Helens, Knowsley and Sefton”

  1. FOOD UP
    PETROL UP
    GAS UP
    LECKY UP
    WATER UP
    RENT UP
    INFLATION UP
    MP SALARIES UP
    COUNCILLOR ALLOWANCES UP
    SNOOPING UP
    WAR FOOTING UP
    STRESS UP
    PUBLIC IGNORANCE UP
    COUNCIL TAX UP
    POLITICAL REPRESENTATION DOWN

  2. FOOD UP
    PETROL UP
    GAS UP
    LECKY UP
    WATER UP
    RENT UP
    INFLATION UP
    MP SALARIES UP
    COUNCILLOR ALLOWANCES UP
    SNOOPING UP
    WAR FOOTING UP
    STRESS UP
    PUBLIC IGNORANCE UP
    COUNCIL TAX UP
    POLITICAL REPRESENTATION DOWN

    1. Dear John, I’m so sorry to learn of your Leonorra’s passing. I hope in time the pain of your loss lessens and you’ll be happy once again.
      My best wishes and warmest regards to you. Rob.

      1. Thanks Rob, Leonora’s on my mind at the moment as there will be a short inquest hearing of the local Coroner about her tomorrow (2nd March 2022).

        Plus applying for a Blue Badge today made me think of her and the frustrations she had with that process.

  3. Yeah! I think you speak for the whole Nation there!
    Just want to know why every year everything goes up, when i was a kid a Milky way cost two pence, two pence that’s around 1p in todays money, how much does a Milky Way cost today around 40p, a Mars Bar was three pence they around the 60 -70p today. I know money is tight whatever era one grew up in, but it’s getting out of hand, Doesn’t the Government know the more we pay for petrol the more we all pay for everything else, yet they never reduce the tax on fuel! including the VAT so they are just adding to that rise all the time.

    1. Thanks for your comment. People appear to be panic buying petrol today (25th February 2022) because of concerns that what’s happening in Ukraine and sanctions on Russia is going to send the price of petrol up.

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