MORE than £2,700,000 of unpaid council tax was owed to Ceredigion County Council at the end of the 2015/16 financial year.

With the council facing millions of pounds of further cuts to help balance its budget, figures released by the Welsh Government showed there were arrears of council tax of £2.733m at the end of the financial year, a slight increase in the amount of arrears brought forward from the start of the financial year.

A council spokesperson though said the authority had improved the collection rate from 2014/15 to 2015/16. Council finance officers have in past years collected a higher percentage of council tax than budgeted for meaning that the council’s budget benefits from increased council tax payments than estimated for.

The spokesperson said: “The council endeavours to collect the council tax within the financial year that the tax is levied and this in year collection rate has continued to increase whilst still collecting arrears that relate to the previous financial year.

“For example, the arrears outstanding in relation to the financial year 2014/15 as at the 31 March 2016 compared to the previous year have reduced by 56 per cent.

“Of the total arrears of £2.8m, 38.22 per cent relates to 2015/16 and 64.22 per cent relates to the last three years."

See this week’s south editions for the full story, in shops and online now