Lyons review to be published today

The long awaited Lyons Report into local government funding will be published later today, alongside Gordon Brown’s last Budget. The main findings of the report seem to have been leaked to the BBC.

ACCORDING TO THE BBC LYONS WILL CALL FOR

• Two extra council tax bands at either end of the price spectrum - a new band for the most expensive homes and an additional lower one for the cheapest properties
• People entitled to council tax benefit to gain it automatically instead of being claimed
  Council tax revaluation before any changes
• Allowing people to hold more in savings before losing the right to council tax help

A tourist or ‘bed tax’ as an extra source of local authority income may also be included, but it will be up to councils to decided whether to adopt this.

Despite some of our hopes Lyons will not suggest returning the business rate to local control.

According to the BBC, the new top bracket for Council tax will be homes worth around £1m

Communities Secretary Ruth Kelly to the Guardian on Sunday that revaluation would definitely not happen in the life of the current parliamentFor more information on Lyons and the budget go to http://news.bbc.co.uk/