Parish Finances

In the 2005/6 financial year the residents of the Oswestry Rural Parish paid an average (band D) precept of £22.50 on their council tax, giving the Parish a budget of £31,000 for the year, based on about 1500 households.

We do not have a breakdown of exactly how this money is being spent, hopefully that will appear here in due course. Meanwhile there is little evidence of much of it being spent in the Maesbury and Aston Ward - are we merely subsidising the people of Morda and Trefonen...?

Comparisons with other Parish Councils:

Knockin - £31.19 on the council tax for a budget of £3,300

Oswestry Town - £39.00 for a budget of £200,000 (they have extra income from car parks etc)

Llanyblodwel - £14.95 - the cheapest parish in the Borough.

- so the Rural Parish is currently around the middle of these.

The Maesbury and Aston Ward has a total population of about 600 - approx. 400 electors and 200 under 18. This would give us about 300 households paying council tax (even this is about twice the size of Knockin Parish).

The amount of the precept depends on the budget set by the Parish Council. If a future Maesbury Parish Council kept to the current £22.50 it would produce a local budget of £6,750 - all of it to be spent locally.

- about £1600 of this would go on employing a Parish Clerk, to work solely for local people for a couple of hours a week.
- under current agreements another £900 approx. would go to the Burial Joint Committee for the maintenance of the Oswestry Cemetery (joint with all the other councils in the Oswestry area, though there seem to be some differences of opinion about this and it may need to be renegotiated).

Alternatively the future Maesbury Parish Council could cut the budget, and make a small reduction in the council tax - either way residents of this area are likely to be better off than at present.