Parker: No Mayoral levy on council tax bills

Despite a projected funding gap of £93 million in the West Midlands Combined Authority’s (WMCA) for 2025/26, Mr Parker said the authority would “explore every avenue” to make up the difference before introducing a Mayoral precept.

The mayor has the power to introduce a charge on all seven local councils in the region to help pay for some of the work he does.

His predecessor Andy Street didn’t introduce a precept during his tenure, although the WMCA budget defeated his proposal for introducing a levy in 2018.

Mr Parker told a meeting of the WMCA Joint Scrutiny and Overview Committee: “Those (funding) issues have largely arrived through funding issues in our transport system that has been underfunded for a long time both in terms of absolute numbers and comparators with other regions.

“It’s also a consequence of the fact that leaders of councils in this region have not increased the transport levy for a considerable period of time.

“We have some issues about funding those gaps, funding our transport system and they are at the heart of conservations with the secretary of state and the Treasury at this point in time. We also need additional funding to keep the bus network going.

“Those conversations are live and ongoing and we will have more details about the Government support for this region in terms of our priorities around transport post October 30.

“I’ve been really clear in my campaign and since I’ve got no intention of raising a precept and we only get there if there really is nowhere else to go.

“We’re not in that position at the moment but something that is really important about the precept is I can only raise a precept for functions defined as mayoral functions.

And that has been agreed through a statutory instrument. Transport, as defined in that, is not a mayoral function.

“The biggest challenge we face around funding is around transport and a mayoral precept if I levied one wouldn’t be able to address those issues in any case.

“Given the lead times in levying a precept and given the legal and regulatory constraints around its use, I am able to say pretty clearly there won’t be a precept in 25/26.

“The position will be reviewed but, at this point in time, I have no intention of raising a precept and we will seek to explore every other avenue to fill the funding gaps we have for this region.”