Council services and contact numbers over Christmas and the New Year

DCC Customer Access Points and most other county council buildings will be closed over the Christmas and New Year holiday period. Please see below for alternative contact details.

**Please note that information about bin collections and Household Waste Recycling Centres (skips) can be found in links on a separate article here: https://robcrute-blackhall.blogspot.com/2021/12/refuse-collections-over-christmas-and.html

Durham County Council: 03000 260 000. Website for additional information: https://www.durham.gov.uk/

Private Sector Housing: 03000 268 000

Monk Hesleden Parish Council: https://www.monkhesleden-pc.gov.uk/

Believe Housing: 0300 1311 999

East Durham Trust: 0191 569 3511

Northern Powergrid: 0800 011 3332

Northumbrian Water: 0345 717 1100

Non-Emergency Police: 101 

Non-Urgent Health Care: 111 

Citizens’ Advice (Consumer Helpline): 0808 223 1133 or go to: https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/

Customer Access Points remain closed until further notice following the introduction of the Government’s Plan B winter response.

In the event of an emergency, residents can still contact the council on 03000 260000 or use the 24/7 automated payments line on 0300 456 2771.

If you are concerned about someone who is vulnerable or at risk, you should contact Social Care Direct and the Emergency Duty Team on 03000 267979. The service will be open across the Christmas and New Year period.

Online services will still be accessible over the festive period but requests may not be processed until council offices reopen on Tuesday, 4 January.

Register offices will close at 12.30pm on Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve and will be closed from Christmas Day until Wednesday 29 December, New Year’s Day and Monday, 3 January. Bishop Auckland and Durham register offices will be open between these dates by appointment only. To make an appointment call 03000 266 000.

Leisure centres will be closed from 4pm on Christmas Eve until Wednesday, 29 December. They will also close at 4pm on New Year’s Eve and reopen on Tuesday, 4 January.

Council libraries will close over the festive period. For more details, please check individual library hours at www.durham.gov.uk/libraryonline. Residents will still be able to access the library’s Borrowbox app with their library membership cards.

Pathways day centres for adults will be closed from Christmas Day until Wednesday, 29 December, New Year’s Day and Monday, 3 January. Hawthorn House short-break service will be closed from 10am on Wednesday, 22 December until Monday 27 December at 2pm.                                         

Family centres are working in new ways to provide support with all buildings currently closed. Users are advised to call 03000 261 111 for advice, support and guidance.

The council’s Welfare Assistance Service will be closed on Bank Holidays and weekends and will be open reduced hours, from 8.30am to 12pm on Christmas Eve, and from 9am to 3pm on Wednesday, 29 December and Thursday, 30 December. It will also be open 9am to 12pm on New Year’s Eve. The service can be contacted on 03000 267 900.

County Durham Together, the council’s community hub, will be closed from 12.30pm on Christmas Eve until 9am on Tuesday, 4 January. During this time, residents who test positive for Covid-19 and those having to isolate after being identified as close contacts of someone who has tested positive, can access food or other essential supplies by contacting The British Red Cross - National Support Line on 0808 196 3651. Lines are open daily between 10am and 6pm.

Sevenhills DLI research and study centre, in Spennymoor, will close on Tuesday, 21 December and reopen for appointments on Tuesday, 4 January. Please email dlicollectionenquiries@durham.gov.uk for research appointments. A member of staff will get back to you from 4 January.  

Durham County Record Office will close from Friday, 24 December until Tuesday, 4 January. From January, the record office search room will temporarily close to visitors. However, staff will continue to respond to online enquiries. More information can be found at http://www.durhamrecordoffice.org.uk

The Park and Ride service will not operate between Christmas Day and Tuesday, 28 December and between New Year’s Day and Tuesday, 4 January. On Tuesday, 28 December a 15-minute service will run between 9am and 6pm serving both Sniperley and Belmont, while Howlands will remain closed. All sites will operate as normal from Wednesday, 29 December to Friday 31 December and again from Tuesday, 4 January. Parking in all council on and off-street car parks continues to be free after 2pm.

Please note that some information may be subject to change should there be further updates to local and national coronavirus restrictions.  For the latest coronavirus information, please visit www.durham.gov.uk/coronavirus

Residents can also keep up-to-date with any changes to council services by following @durhamcouncil on Twitter or on Facebook.

Refuse Collections over Christmas and the New Year

Refuse and recycling bins will be emptied as normal up to and including on Christmas Eve. They will resume on Tuesday 28 December, with no changes to collection days over the New Year period.

For details about bin collections in your street please follow the link below and enter your postcode:

http://mydurham.durham.gov.uk/article/12689/My-Durham-search

For details about the council’s waste and refuse collection service, including bin collection dates, skip site opening hours and details of what to do if your bin has been missed, please follow the link below:

https://www.durham.gov.uk/recycling

Proportional Property Tax - A Fairer Alternative to Council Tax

I tabled a motion at the full meeting of Durham County Council held on Wednesday 8 December 2021 asking the council to acknowledge that the current council tax system is unfair and to consider the benefits that a replacement proportional property tax would bring to our residents.

With characteristic swagger the Tory-led coalition ‘amended’ the motion, meaning that they can claim control of the motion and assume the right to deal with it as they wish.

The concern is that the Tories, leading the Lib Dems in coalition in county hall, will now discard any reference to a proportional property tax and attempt to give the impression that seeking to reform the council tax regime will have a similar effect in reducing bills. However, in reality we know that the Tories will never adopt a proportional property tax because whilst it would benefit our residents in County Durham and other working-class areas across the North it would be more costly to their voters in the prosperous Tory heartlands of South-East England.

However, Labour members will make sure that the Tories deliver on the motion’s promise to carry out a review into the council tax system and how it places a disproportionate burden on those least able to pay. We’ll then use every opportunity to press the coalition into supporting a proportional property tax - a fairer system that would reap benefits for the majority of residents in County Durham and beyond. 

I’ve published below the text of my motion and the rationale I used in introducing my motion to the council meeting:

Proposal: The current Council Tax system is outdated, unfair and no longer fit for purpose. Therefore, this council agrees to pursue every available opportunity – including the involvement of appropriate government departments and other agencies as necessary – to consider the benefits and feasibility of adopting a fairer system in the form of a Proportional Property Tax

Whenever it crops up in conversation it’s almost universally accepted that the current Council Tax system is outdated and unfair – especially to those people living in towns and villages like our own in County Durham where the burden of Council Tax falls disproportionately on young people, on low-earners and on those struggling to get by. 

 

Successive governments have had 30 years to reform the CT system but none have taken that opportunity, suggesting that the entire system is beyond reform and in need of replacement by a fairer, more equitable system.

 

That leaves us with just two main options: we either plough on regardless, doing nothing until the system reaches breaking point. Or we seek to find a better, fairer way of doing things.

 

The first option of course won’t benefit anyone, so I suggest that we need to take a closer look at the benefits of a Proportional Property Tax – a fairer system that relieves the hardest hit of the heaviest burden, reduces housing market inequalities, frees-up homes to those who need them most and a system that actually puts money into people’s pockets and kick-starts our local economies. Something that is so badly needed in our area where the Northern Powerhouse has failed and the government’s ‘levelling-up’ agenda is revealed to be nothing more than empty rhetoric.

 

Without wishing to go into detail at this stage we could focus instead on the core principles of a Proportional Property Tax and also take a closer look at the main benefits – all well-researched and fully costed (these have been provided by the Fairer Share campaign - details in the link at the bottom of this page):

 

Principles include the notion:

Property taxation should be based on actual property wealth: the burden should be shared proportionately

Property taxation should be simple to understand, easy to administer and hard to avoid

Property taxation should be fair, with wealthier regions supporting other areas

Property taxation should relate to a household’s ability to pay and

Property taxation should encourage the most efficient use of land and buildings

 

Benefits nationally include:

18m households would be better off, with 75% paying less tax

£6.5bn would be saved by council tax payers outside London, representing a huge boost to our local communities and economies

8.7m households would be taken out of property tax entirely because the obligation to pay falls to the landlord rather than the tenant

Each year 750k house buyers would no longer have to pay Stamp Duty, making house buying simpler and cheaper

An increase in GDP of over £3bn a year from increased housing market activity and

600k homes over 5 years would be released, freeing up homes for younger people and those who need them most

If we can accept those principles at this stage, and agree that the benefits of a fairer system outweigh the current burden of the Council Tax and Stamp Duty regime we can then as an authority work together with any external agency necessary to make change happen for the benefit of our local councils and their communities – and more importantly for the benefit of the residents of County Durham and elsewhere who deserve a better, fairer system after decades of bearing a disproportionate tax burden.

 

Cllr Rob Crute

Blackhall Division

Durham County Council

For details about the campaign for a Proportional Property Tax please go to the Fairer Share manifesto page at:

https://fairershare.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Fairer-Share_Manifesto.pdf

A Selective Licensing Scheme for County Durham

Regular readers of these pages will know that I’ve been pressing the council for the past few years to introduce a Selective Licensing Scheme to help to address the many issues we have in our towns and villages associated with the poor condition of some properties in the private-rented sector (please go to the article dated Monday 21 September 2020 for background details and links to other articles on this matter: https://robcrute-blackhall.blogspot.com/2020/09/private-rented-housing-improvement.html)

The council has announced today that the government has given approval for a Selective Licensing Scheme in County Durham from April next year. Full details here:

An application was made to central government in December 2020 for a large-scale Selective Licensing scheme in County Durham.

The scheme covers 42% of the private rented sector (PRS) in County Durham and (approximately 28,000 homes), and is focused on areas that can suffer from issues such as deprivation and anti-social behaviour.

I am pleased to inform members that the application made by Durham County Council has been supported by the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and Durham County Council can now commence the process of implementation for the scheme across the County. I would like at this point to thank the teams involved in the process.

The Objectives of selective licensing

·         A key objective of the County Durham Housing Strategy 2019 to 2024 is to maintain and improve standards across County Durham’s housing stock and the wider housing environment which includes developing an approach to selective licensing, addressing empty homes, improving energy efficiency of properties and supporting and maintaining communities. 

·         The proposal to introduce selective licensing is a significant practical policy intervention and is complementary to other actions in the strategy. 

·         The lack of access to good quality housing is accepted to be a contributing factor to inequalities in health, educational attainment, and disposable income (poverty).

·         Selective licensing provides a regulatory framework which allows for pro-active monitoring of the private rented sector and the opportunity for enforcement against poor landlords at the earliest opportunity.  It facilitates a full multi-agency approach making the best use of a range of powers available in addition to selective licensing. 

Durham County Council will commence issuing licences from 1 April 2022 with the application process opening in February 2022. In line with legal requirements, the notice will be placed on our housing web pages today, along with a paper copy in noticeboards across the designated areas.

Information on how to apply and discounts available, will be published on the website soon but the discounts will remain the same as agreed during consultation.

I will update on developments as soon as I have additional details from the council.