Reform UK council tax amendment will place Doncaster Council under extra financial strain, officers warn
Reform UK’s amendment to Mayor Ros Jones’ budget will put additional financial risk and strain on the City of Doncaster Council, finance officials have warned.
Councillors will meet today (Thursday, February 26) to potentially set the council’s budget for the 2026/27 financial year.
Most of the Mayor of Doncaster’s budget proposals look set to pass without issue, however, Reform UK have tabled an amendment to the Mayor’s revenue budget – a £750million budget detailing the council’s day-to-day expenditure and income.
This includes an increase to council tax, which is the key issue Reform UK are seeking to change.
Finance officers, namely the chief financial officer, Faye Tyas, has warned in a statutory Section 25 statement that Reform’s amendment increases the future financial risk to the council.
Ms Tyas said Mayor Jones’ budget already included a £10m “cliff-edge” at the end of 2028/29, when the council’s new multi-year financial settlement with the Government comes to an end, due to a £10m Recovery Grant not extending beyond that year.
The CFO’s statement says Reform UK’s amendment worsens the “cliff-edge” by 50 per cent, bringing the total risk to the council to £15m, which could need to be funded by cuts or increased fees and charges in future.
Additionally, Ms Tyas warns that just under £3m of additional savings (cuts or fee increases) will need to be found over 2026/27 (£2.1m), 2027/28 (£0.4m) and 2028/29 (£0.4m), if Reform UK’s amendment is approved.
The statement states Reform UK’s additional savings, proposed to fund the lower rise in council tax, will be “challenging to deliver” and some of those savings are “still to be determined for 2027/28”.
Despite the eye-opening increase in risk to the council’s finances, Ms Tyas said she could still “give positive assurance on the reliability and robustness of the forecasts and estimates in the budget proposals”, describing it as “sufficiently robust”.
Mayor Jones proposed a 4.99 per cent hike in council tax, the maximum allowed, however, Reform UK have tabled a rise of just two per cent.
Councillor Craig Ward, leader of the Reform UK group, previously outlined that his party would keep the two per cent increase for Adult Social Care, but would reduce the general council tax increase to zero.
Ward said his party would protect adult and children’s social care services, which represents more than 70 per cent of Doncaster’s revenue expenditure every year.
Reform UK’s amendment dropping the council tax increase to two per cent (which must be spent on Adult social care) was certified as producing “a balanced position in the 2026/27 financial year”.
Responding to officer’s warnings relating to Reform UK’s amendment, Cllr Ward said he was unhappy with Ms Tyas’ “risk framing”.
In a letter to officers, Cllr Ward pointed out that £10m of the £15m “cliff-edge” was already in Mayor Jones’ budget, and attacked officers – claiming “equivalent scrutiny” was not applied to savings in the Mayor’s budget.
“We were told there was no alternative to 4.99 per cent. That was wrong.”
Reform UK were not part of discussions relating to Mayor Jones’ budget and the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) understands her proposals were heavily scrutinised by officers in the development stage.
The Mayor’s budget was also publicly scrutinised by the Overview and Scrutiny Management Committee of councillors, which Reform UK’s was not.
Cllr Ward also said: “We were told there was no alternative to 4.99 per cent. That was wrong.
“We have demonstrated that a responsible, lawful 2 per cent budget exists which protects services and supports residents during a cost-of-living squeeze.
“Officers have now certified our budget as compliant with the law. The choice before councillors is clear.”
The budget is one of the few areas Reform UK’s majority has any influence or power, due to the council’s directly elected mayor system.
Mayor Ros Jones and her Labour cabinet make around 95 per cent of key decisions, without input from other councillors.
Reform UK has already received public backing from the Conservative group and Advance UK for its amendment, meaning it is likely to be passed and implemented into Mayor Jones’ budget.
Labour party sources have suggested the amendment effectively “locks in” maximum council tax increases for the following years, describing the amendment as a short-term “headline” for the lower council tax increase, with medium to long-term risk.
Doncaster Council already has the lowest and cheapest council tax in Yorkshire and the seventh lowest of any metropolitan districts and unitary authorities.