Biddulph Town Council has approved an increase of just over £8,000 in its latest precept for 2021-2022.

At a meeting on Tuesday (9th February), councillors approved a precept of £370,365 - an increase of £8,150 for this year.

This equates to an increase of £1.47 per household, per year for a Band D property.

However, the council also agreed not to increase any of the fees for its services after acknowledging that is has been "a challenging year for all residents of Biddulph".

A town council spokesperson said: "The town council has an ambitious programme of improvements for new assets and projects, but will use earmarked reserves to deliver the majority of these developments.

"The hope is that the burden on the taxpayer will not be too onerous as the community returns to some sort of normality; however, councillors remain committed to delivering improvements and high quality services across the town."

They added: "The Town Council is operating in an environment where it no longer receives a support grant to supplement the precept request and has a lower tax base (Band D equivalent) in 2021-22."

The chair of the town council's Finance Strategy and Management Committee, Councillor Tony Hall, said: "Councillors were united in their decision to find a balance between delivering excellent services, increasing and enhancing the services that are provided in the town and ensuring that the tax payer does not have to find significant additional resources in order to fund this work.

"This is a challenging time for us all, but we hope that during 2021 residents of Biddulph will be able to return to some sort of normality, and Biddulph Town Council will be working proactively to support them."