London council hammers residents with record 94% increase in council tax
A Band D property will be charged an additional £958 from April 2027
Residents of a London borough once known as Margaret Thatcher's favourite are being hammered by a 94% increase in council tax.
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The historically low-tax Wandsworth Council will hike council tax bills for thousands of residents from next year.
A Band D property will be charged an additional £958 from April 2027 under the plans approved on Tuesday night.
The record rise will take the Tory-run council from having one of the lowest council tax rates in the country to average levels.
Councillors voted in favour of the planned rise following the outcome of a spending review. A final decision will be reached early next year.
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Wandsworth Council blamed the increase on government's reforms to local authority funding, which have seen grant funding shifted away from London boroughs and towards the North of England.
The council said the reforms had left the authority short of £84million a year.
Deputy leader of Wandsworth Council Peter Graham said increasing taxes would "not be easy or welcome" and that the council would be doing so reluctantly.
He said: “Council tax will need to rise unless Government thinks again. And it must think again.
“We do not want to do this, and we do not take this decision lightly, but the scale of the financial pressure facing Wandsworth means additional income is now needed to protect the services people rely on."
Wandsworth - one of London's most populous boroughs with around 340,000 residents - was historically the Conservative's flagship London local authority.
The borough was under Tory control from 1978 to 2022, and was known as Thatcher's favourite, until Labour took over.
It has been under no overall control since the May 2026 elections, and is currently run by a minority Conservative administration.
In addition to reducing grant funding, the government has given Wandsworth, Kensington & Chelsea, Westminster, Hammersmith & Fulham and the City of London powers to hike council tax by above the 5% cap for five years.
Previously a tax hike above the cap would have required a local referendum.
A government spokesperson said: "We have consulted extensively on reforming the outdated council funding system to ensure money goes where it is most needed, following on from a long-standing consensus."
They added: "We're also protecting councils through transitional arrangements so no area faces a cliff edge."