brill parish council : Budget 2024/25

A message from the Parish Council Finance sub-committee
comprising Cllrs Jennifer Tuffley and Steven Judge, and the Parish Clerk

We are very fortunate in Brill to have so many volunteers willing to give their time to care for our amenities and environment; maintaining the Common and windmill, running the Memorial Hall, caring for the Brill Herd and so on. There are, however, some aspects of community life that require funding through the local council tax - or ‘precept’.

The precept covers three main categories of costs:

  • maintenance of village amenities and services

  • public safety

  • administration and communication

Village amenities include street lighting, grass cutting, emptying waste bins, and additional services such as the installation of speed indicator devices. This category also includes grants to local groups such as the Memorial Hall Committee and The Brill Society. The Brill Society required an additional £16,000 this financial year to pay specialist contractors for urgent repairs to the windmill. Skilled volunteer labour prevented this figure being far higher.

Public safety is ensured through annual payments for public liability insurance and regular safety inspections of the children’s playgrounds.There was a considerable overspend this year to employ a tree surgeon to make safe trees on Brill Common and The Walks found on formal inspection to be in a dangerous condition.

Administration and communication includes the salary of our part-time Parish Clerk, website maintenance and newsletter production, and external audit of our accounts. Bobs Damerell, the Parish Clerk, is an experienced clerk and an asset to the village. His duties include ordering services and paying suppliers, tracking spending, organising meetings of the Parish Council, and advising councillors on financial, legal and procedural issues.

The Parish Council is forecasting a total expenditure for 2023/24 of approximately £85,000. The precept for this period was £50,800. The Parish Council also received small additional grants of £5,000 which are passed directly to other groups such as the Brill Community Herd. We authorised an overspend to pay for essential repairs to the windmill and resolve tree safety issues. Fortunately, an exceptional VAT refund of £24,900 meant that we will only needed to withdraw a few thousand pounds from reserves. A full breakdown of all costs will be published after the end of the financial year.

With windmill and tree work completed, expenditure is expected to return to a more normal level in 2024/25. This said, costs are likely to rise in line with inflation and maintenance of the Common will remain an important issue for the community. Moreover, a detailed analysis of expenditure has revealed few opportunities for cost-saving. The Parish Council will therefore be requesting an increase in the precept similar to the likely general rise in council tax imposed by Bucks Council; around 5%.