Precept

What is it?

The Parish Council’s primary source of income is the parish precept, which is a sum of money ‘precepted’ on the principal authority – Harrogate Borough Council – who then levy on tax payers in the parish as part of the Council Tax billing.

The precept is converted into an amount per Council Tax Band that is added onto the Council Tax bill. In the Harrogate Borough, the precept amount is divided by the number of properties in the parish that fall into council tax band D, in the same way as the Harrogate Borough Council council tax is calculated. The amount of the Parish precept per household is shown on your Council Tax bill.

Parish councils are the only local government organisation which does not have a cap in terms of how much it can increase the precept each year. Unless there are extraordinary circumstances, it is common practice for Parish Councils to increase the precept in line with inflation, if at all.

How is it set?

The precept amount is agreed by the Council following the preparation of the budget for the following year. The amount represents the difference between the expected expenditure and contributions to reserves and all sources of income (other than the precept) less any contribution from the reserves. The amount is paid by the principal authority to the Parish Council in two six monthly installments.

Precept Amounts

The following table shows the precept levied by the Parish Council in recent years.

Precept Amounts

Financial YearPrecept% Change
2000 - 2001£9250%
2001 - 2002£1,25035%
2002 - 2003£3,050144%
2003 - 2004£3,90028%
2004 - 2005£5,00028%
2005 - 2006£5,0000%
2006 - 2007£5,2585%
2007 - 2008£5,2580%
2011 - 2012£5,3181%
2012 - 2013£5,3180%
2013 - 2014£5,3180%
2014 - 2015£5,3180%
2015 - 2016£5,3180%
2016 - 2017£5,4242%
2017 - 2018£5,5322%
2018 - 2019£5,6983%
2019 - 2020£5,8302%
2020 - 2021£6,3559%
2021 - 2022£6,3550%
2022 - 2023£6,3560%

Precept Applications

The precept applications to the principal authority since 2012-13 may be viewed below. These documents are also available in the Document Library.

Precept Applications Documents

To view the required document, select its Document Name

IDDocument NameTypeSize
0404Precept 2021-22Portable Document Format497 KB
0357Precept 2012-13Portable Document Format69kB
0207Precept 2020-21Portable Document Format150Kb
0206Precept 2019-20Portable Document Format278Kb
0205Precept 2018-19Portable Document Format274Kb
0204Precept 2017-18Portable Document Format844Kb
0203Precept 2016-17Portable Document Format278Kb
0202Precept 2015-16Portable Document Format262Kb
0201Precept 2014-15Portable Document Format578Kb
0200Precept 2013-14Portable Document Format615Kb
Total Documents10
What is the Document List?

ID

This is the unique identifier of the document within the library.  Use this number if you need to report an issue with a document.

Document Name

This is the title of the document. Select the name to view and or download the document in a separate window.

Type

This is the format of the document file. If you are using a mouse, hover over the type image to see a description of the document type.  See below for more information on the Document Types.

Size

This is the size of the document file in Kilobytes (Kb) or Megabytes (Mb). The size is N/A if the document is in one of the Google formats

How do I navigate the Document List?

The List Length

The document list is initially displayed with the first 10 entries visible. The Show Entries drop-down selection box, above and to the left of the document list, may be used to show more (or less) entries at a time. The number of list entries currently shown and the total number of entries in the full list is displayed below the document list.

Pagination

The Previous, Page No. and Next buttons below the document list may be used to navigate between the list pages if not all the list entries are shown at once.

The List Length and Pagination work together. Changing the List Length as above changes the number of pages accordingly.

Note that if the total number of documents in the list is less than 10, neither the List Length selection box or the Pagination buttons are displayed.

Sorting

The documents are initially listed in a pre-defined order. The list order may be changed by selecting either the ID or Document Name column headings. The up/down arrow on the right side of the colum heading indicates the current sort direction. Selecting the column heading again reverses the sort order.

Note that changing the sort direction affects all the documents in the list, not just those that may be currently visible. When changing the sort order, the list is re-displayed from the first page if the list is currently paginated.

What are the Document Types?

Documents with the type are PDFs. PDF is a cross-platform file format developed by Adobe. Documents from any application can be converted to PDF format. PDF documents retain the original appearance/layout/print quality independent of the files native application and platform.

Documents with the type are Google Docs.

Documents with the type are Google Sheets.

Documents with the type are Google Slides.

Documents with the type are Google Forms.

All documents in a Google format are automatically converted to a specified format when downloaded.

How do I Download a Document?

This will depend upon the device (desktop, laptop, tablet, smartphone etc.), the application (web browser, app etc.) that you are using to view the website and the file type of the selected document (see above).

Some devices will automatically download a document before displaying it using a file reader installed on the device, for example Adobe Acrobat or Foxit. Some web browsers will prompt for a download when the document is selected whilst others will open the document using a built-in file reader. You will need to explore the options of your device and web browser.

You will need a PDF reader to open and read a downloaded PDF document. There are many free PDF readers available, including Foxit Reader and Adobe Acrobat .

Documents that are stored on the Parish Council Google Drive will be displayed using the respective Google Docs, Sheets, Forms or Slides application. When the document is displayed, use File - Download As - [format] from the menu bar to download a copy of the document in the selected format. You can then either save the document on your local device or print the document by opening it in the appropriate local application and using the application print facility.