6 November 2024SLCC has received an email from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) confirming the position for local councils in England in relation to the additional costs of employer’s National Insurance contributions from April 2025, which were announced in the Autumn Budget:
I wanted to reach out following the Budget increase in Employer National Insurance contributions and what it means for parish and town councils. We are conscious that this will impact the finances of town and parish councils, and have been discussing the implications of these changes with colleagues at the Treasury. I’m writing to confirm that town and parish councils will not be included in a package to compensate public sector bodies for this rise.
The policy set by the Chancellor is to compensate those who are direct public sector employees funded out of public money. Parish councils are not directly funded by central government and so do not fall into this category.
We recognise that this will require town and parish councils to make some difficult financial decisions, and in particular that many may need to raise their precept, and that some may need to make staffing cuts in order to meet these new costs. We understand neither of these decisions will be taken lightly by your members.
SLCC will continue to discuss with MHCLG the implications of this decision for town and parish councils. If you have any points or comments you would like to make on the practical consequences of managing these decisions, please forward these to Michael King, Head of Policy & External Communications [email protected] so that we can prepare case studies to share with the ministry.
