Adur and Worthing council tax to rise for 2025/2026

The Adur District Council and Worthing Borough Council cabinets agreed to the 2.99 per cent rise, as well as their draft capital and revenue budgets for 2025/26, at meetings on Thursday, January 30, and Tuesday, February 4, respectively.

Residents’ council tax bills are also likely to see an increase in West Sussex County Council’s precept, by 4.99 per cent, and the Sussex Police precept, by 5.5 per cent.

Total annual council tax for an average Band D property in Adur will see an increase from £2,301.58 in 2024/25, to £2,411.16 in 2025/26, and in Worthing will see an increase from £2,235.48, to £2,343.12.

Adur Homes rents are also set to go up, by 2.7 per cent, with average weekly council rent to rise from £114.06 to £117.19.

A bid for exceptional funding support, sought by Worthing Borough Council from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) in December, is expected to be successful, according to a report presented to the council’s cabinet.

The council applied for the support to help balance a £2.53million shortfall in its 2025/26 budget, with concerns it would otherwise have to issue a section 114 notice, effectively declaring bankruptcy.

The report said the amount the council was requesting had fallen from £2.7million to £2million, following a reduction in the budget shortfall to around £1.82 million, due to the proposed 2.99 per cent council tax increase.

The £180,000 difference will cover the cost of borrowing for the exceptional funding support.

It said the council would not know the final decision of MHCLG on the support until the end of the month/beginning of March, but indications from the ministry had been ‘positive’.

As of March 31 2024, Worthing council had £1.604million in general reserves, set to drop to an estimated £1.038 million by the same time this year, and rise to roughly £3.038million in 2026.

The council will need to balance a projected £4.8million shortfall in 2026/27, increasing to £5.292million in 2027/28 – with the council’s exceptional funding support request only covering 2025/26.

Worthing Council Leader Sophie Cox (Lab, Castle) said the budget and request for funding support was putting the council in a ‘resilient’ position, looking for ‘long-term stability’.

“We know local government has been undergoing huge challenges, for now over a decade, with half of councils at risk of issuing a 114 notice and only four per cent feeling confident in the long term sustainability of local government finance,” she said.

“We know that balancing our budget this year would have been a lot more achievable if it weren’t for the serious and sustained pressures that we have in housing and housing need.”

The exceptional funding support ‘will seek to act as a bridging measure and will seek to give us time for our long term strategy focused on income generation, and for asset rationalisation and external funding to take effect’.

Special expenses for an extra £30.06 will be levied on top of Adur council tax bills for 2025/26, across all areas except for Lancing, for maintenance of recreation grounds and provision of community buildings as agreed by the council in 1995.

Adur council will see a balanced 2025/26 budget with a £162,000 surplus, to be transferred into reserves, after facing an estimated £900,000 shortfall in October last year.

As of March 31 2024, Adur council had around £2.335 million in general reserves, set to rise to an estimated £2.647 million the same time this year, and to £3.747 in 2026.

The council faces a budget shortfall of £1.411 million in 2026/27, with that deficit estimated to rise by around half a million pounds every year the next three years.

Adur Cabinet Member for Finance and Resources Saffa Jan (Lab, Peverel) said the council tax increase would be what the council needed to ‘balance the books’.

He said: “The budget also sets out how we make our services more sustainable, by increasing some fees and charges including planning advice and the collection of green waste, so that they are funded by those who use them.”

The draft budget and council tax rises will still need to gain approval from the two full councils at their next meetings on February 20 and 25 for Adur and Worthing respectively, before coming into effect on April 1 this year.