Opinion, Watford Observer, 14 December 2024: Watford's LibDem council under fire for tax increases | Watford Observer
More tax increases for local residents.
Not the new Labour Government this time but Watford’s Liberal Democrat Borough Council.
Whilst many local residents are struggling to cope with the new burdens being placed on them by the Government with increased National Insurances costs and the cancellation of the winter fuel allowance for most pensioners, our town’s Liberal Democrats are making the situation worse with a raft of increased charges, well above the rate of inflation, that will take effect in a few weeks.
For a start, the Liberal Democrat council continues to undermine local businesses and retailers with its relentless ideological war on car owners. Car park charges in central car parks run by the council, such as The Avenue and Town Hall, will rise by over 20 per cent and street parking costs in places like St Albans Road will also go up substantially.
All this means it will cost more to use local shops, driving customers away.
The LibDem council just doesn’t get business or the need to encourage local shop owners to build their businesses and create jobs. To take a look at a few more examples of how they tax local businesses: food outlets will see food hygiene re-inspections increase by 26 per cent and skin piercing businesses will have their operator licence go up by over a third and premises licences by a quarter.
Local car owners will also face significant above-inflation increases to park their cars near their homes, around ten per cent more.
And local residents with gardens face a similar increase in the waste collection charge as Watford’s ‘gardening tax’ rises by over nine per cent.
The LibDem council justifies these separate stealth taxes as following the ‘user pays’ principle. But many local residents don’t have children and so don’t use local schools. Do the Liberal Democrats believe they shouldn’t pay for education? Of course not.
The ‘user pays’ principle in this case is just a clever way of targeting certain taxpayers, especially those with gardens and cars, to make them cough up even more with above inflation increases, regardless of whether it hurts local businesses.
It isn’t right and it isn’t fair.
Stephen Woodard
Chairman, Watford Conservatives