The Secretary of State made an offer to adult social care authorities. ("Adult social care authorities" are local authorities which have functions under Part 1 of the Care Act 2014, namely county councils in England, district councils for an area in England for which there is no county council, London borough councils, the Common Council of the City of London and the Council of the Isles of Scilly).
The offer was the option of an adult social care authority being able to charge an additional "precept" on its council tax without holding a referendum, to assist the authority in meeting expenditure on adult social care from the financial year 2016/17. It was originally made in respect of the financial years up to and including 2019/2020.
If the Secretary of State chooses to renew this offer in respect of a particular financial year, this is subject to the approval of the House of Commons.
Adult social care precept
The government has allowed councils which provide social care to adults to increase their share of council tax. This additional charge is called the adult social care precept.
This started in 2016 and is a government requirement that this precept is shown as a separate line on the bill with an amount that is the total for this additional precept rather than the total spend on adult social care.
The 3% increase shown on the bill is an increase on the whole Kent County Council (KCC) amount which results in a total KCC increase of 2.995% (or 3.0% when rounded to one whole decimal place).
The percentage increase is calculated by the total for KCC and the adult social care precept. We collect this charge on behalf of them.
2023/2024
The total precept is £1,534.23 (£1,331.82 plus £202.41)
2022/2023
The total precept was £1,461.24 (£1,287.99 plus £173.25)
2021/2022
The total precept was £1,418.76 (£1,259.64 plus £159.12)
2020/2021
The total precept was £1,351.26 (£1,232.64 plus £118.62)
2019/2020
The total precept was £1,299.42 (£1,206.72 plus £92.70)
2018/2019
The total precept was £1,237.68 (£1,169.64 plus £68.04)
2017/2018
The total precept was £1,178.82 (£1,134.36 plus £44.46)
2016/2017
The total precept was £1,135.55 (£1,111.77 plus £21.78)
The income generated is ring fenced, meaning it can only be used for adult social care services.