Monmouth Town Council have set the precept for the forthcoming financial year. The precept is the amount of money the council need to continue to provide the services and administration they are obliged to offer.

The money comes from the council tax, and the proportion that they received last year from a Band D house in Monmouth was £39.

The town council's Finance and Policy Committee recommended to full council that the precept for 2014-2015 should remain at the current level of £187,424, although given the amount of new housing in the area, the proportion will fall if the precept would stay the same.

Councillor Bob Hayward explained that last years precept had risen considerably to account for the CCTV set-up contribution, which was a one-off payment and would be effectively extra money for the council even with the precept staying at the same level.

To maintain the £39 contribution from a band D property, the precept would have to rise to £191,829, although given reserves were running at a 'prudent' level, it was not altogether necessary to ask for more money.

However Cllr Anne Were suggested the council raise the precept by 10 per cent as "we could be under pressure to subsidise some of the county council services.

"If we have to take that money out of reserves," Cllr Were continued "then next year we would have to put that money back into reserves and increase our precept on top of that again or take the money from somewhere else."

Cllr Owen felt there should be more of a compromise otherwise the council could find them short of money in a few years to come; "10 per cent is extreme, keeping it the same is extreme so increase it by about three per cent."

Cllr Wilson supported Cllr Were's position pointing out that the precept for Monmouth is one of the lowest compared to other towns; "We know the cuts are coming, that is a certainty and we should start moving now to provide the services for the future."

Cllr Graham Pritchard supported the recommendation to keep the precept the same; "It is our legal responsibility to respond by 20th of January and we have a clear recommendation from the Finance and Policy Committee what to do."

Cllr Brian Ramsey said Cllr Were was correct; "as we have the lowest precept in the county and there are towns with similar populations with twice the budget, we are lagging behind and have done so for many years."

The vote to increase the precept by 10 per cent failed as did the vote to increase the precept by two per cent, with the original recommendation finally gaining a majority vote with eight votes for and six against.