Executive summary
Legislation requires that the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) agree their budget and associated precept and basic council tax for the forthcoming year before 1st March each year. However, before doing so the PCC must notify the relevant Police and Crime Panel, by the 31st January, of the precept which they propose to issue for the following financial year.
The Provisional Police Settlement for 2026/27 has provided the PCC with worst funding settlement in the country considering funding provided from the Government and the amount that can be raised from the local precept.
After reflecting that some of the increase in funding being reported by the Government this year refers to funding that covers last year’s pay award, and that both inflation and pay awards are above 3%, then the funding for policing in Cleveland has seen a real terms reduction in its funding from a year ago.
As the funding has failed to keep pace with the level of inflation, and other funding has been removed and reallocated to elsewhere within the country, then it is unfortunately not possible to maintain current levels of service, and difficult choices will be required to balance the budget.
These difficult choices come despite the proposal to increase the precept by £15. Any increase below this level would lead to further reductions in service.
The Government have provided PCCs with the flexibility to increase the police element of the council tax by £15 and have assumed these increases in the communication on overall levels of police funding.
Consultation has been undertaken across Cleveland in relation to the precept options. Across the whole consultation almost 57% of 1,223 respondents indicated that they would be willing to pay up to an additional £18 per year (or more) for policing in their area (for a Band D property).
The above response was broadly replicated across all 4 council areas with support above 50% in each area indicating a willingness to pay up to an additional £18 per year (or more).
Therefore the organisational need for this increase and the resources that they will support, aligned with some significant support from the public for an increase of around £15, is why the PCC is asked to formally proposes a police precept of £332.73 for 2026/27 to the Police and Crime Panel. This is an increase of 4.72% or £15 on a Band D property from 2025/26.
Decision 2025/26 – 027: Police Precept Proposal 2026-2027 (application, 150kB)