Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, with reference to the Written Statement of 26 February 2018 HCWS486 on Local Government Policy, if the drafts of the necessary secondary legislation will include a requirement that the same level of Council tax will be payable by all households on Band D in the unitary authority proposal for Christchurch, Poole and Bournemouth.

The Secretary of State intends to bring forward secondary legislation shortly before the Summer Recess making provision on council tax harmonisation, including specifying by when a new unitary council must equalise council tax over its whole area.

In deciding these provisions, the Secretary of State shall have regard to local preferences, the impact on individual council tax bills across the areas concerned, and the financial implications for the authority - seeking to strike a balance between ensuring council tax payers do not experience a large increase in bills and not allowing residents in any one part of the area to be concerned that they are effectively contributing more to the cost of services than others in the area.