Shropshire and Telford & Wrekin Councils to receive more than £3 million each from Crisis Resilience Fund to help people in need

The Crisis and Resilience Fund (CRF) comes into effect from April 1, with the Government pledging just shy of £2.4 billion over three years.

Council tax could be going up by 8.99 per cent in Shropshire for the 2026/27 financial year, with full council having the final say on February 26.

The primary objective of the fund, says the Government, is to provide a safety net for those on low incomes who encounter a financial shock, and to invest in building local financial resilience to enable individuals and communities to better deal with crises in the long term.

The provisional figures show that Shropshire Council will be given £3.7m for 2026/27 out of a total amount of £831m that will be allocated to all local authorities in England.

In comparison, Telford & Wrekin Council will get £3.1m, and Herefordshire Council £2.3m. The figures could be updated as part of the final settlement that local authorities will receive.

Speaking at last week’s Shropshire Council cabinet meeting Councillor Duncan Kerr (Green, Oswestry South) said that council tax is “the most regressive tax we have” in the sense that the poor pay the most.

“If it was made out of income tax, it would be a fairer distribution of that burden,” said Councillor Kerr.

“My understanding is that we have to put together local schemes, so I would like to know the timeframe because at the moment, it seems people are going to say ‘oh my god, what does it mean for me?’

“The sooner we can have details about the crisis resilience fund available to them, the more reassuring we can be.”

Duncan Whitfield, the chief financial officer at Shropshire Council, said the authority was awaiting instructions from the Government, adding that further details should be published by the end of this week.

“Then we can see how we can make best use out of the fund,” he said.