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Review of Discretionary Rate Relief

Published: 14/01/2016

Flintshire County Council’s Cabinet will consider a report recommending a review of the Discretionary Rate Relief (DRR) scheme at a meeting on Tuesday, 19 January. The DRR provides assistance to organisations that are registered charities and voluntary and non-profit organisations not registered with the Charity Commission. Although the DRR scheme is approved annually by Cabinet, the principles of which organisation gets rate relief and at what level, has not been reviewed since 2010. No changes to the scheme are proposed for 2016/17 as this is a longer-term review. The current scheme provides DRR to 213 organisation totalling £273,131 with the Council meeting annual costs of £103,000 and the Welsh Government £170,131. Cllr. Aaron Shotton, Leader of the Council said, “There is a growing need to carry out a full review of DRR awards which could potentially provide efficiencies for the Council that would help bridge the budget gap from 2017-18 and beyond. The opportunity to review will also help us to consider an alternative scheme that could be implemented from April 2017.