Police and fire precept on your 2026/27 council tax bill

How the police precept appears on the bill

Open any English council tax bill outside London for 2026/27 and you will find a line labelled police and crime commissioner or PCC precept with the annual amount and the percentage increase from last year. On the average English Band D bill that line is approximately £230 a year, with about £14 of it added in 2026/27 alone. The cumulative police precept now accounts for roughly 10 per cent of the average English Band D bill.

The police and crime commissioner is an elected office, created by the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011. There is one PCC per police force area outside London, and they set the policing budget locally. The precept is the part of that budget that comes from council tax rather than central government grant. Across England and Wales the PCC precept funds approximately 30 to 40 per cent of operational policing, with the rest from Home Office grant.

The 2026/27 PCC precept cap

For 2026/27 the standard PCC precept cap was £14 a year on a Band D bill. Most forces took the maximum, which works out as a percentage increase ranging from roughly 5.8 per cent (in lower-precept forces) to roughly 6.6 per cent (in higher-precept forces). A small number of forces, including Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire, were granted permission to raise by more than the standard cap; the additional flexibility is normally negotiated at the policing settlement and reflects specific operational pressures.

The PCC precept cap is set separately from the council tax referendum cap and from the adult social care precept cap. So on a typical 2026/27 upper-tier authority bill, three separate cap mechanisms come together: the 2.99 per cent core council tax cap, the 2 per cent adult social care precept cap, and the £14 PCC precept cap. The total Band D rise across all three was approximately 4.99 per cent plus the PCC element.

The fire precept across England

The fire service in England is funded in one of two ways. In most large metropolitan areas, fire is delivered by a separate fire and rescue authority that sets its own precept on the council tax bill. The Greater Manchester, West Midlands, Merseyside, South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire, Tyne and Wear, and Hampshire and Isle of Wight authorities all operate this way. In other areas, particularly two-tier shire counties, fire is funded through the county council with no separate fire precept line; the cost appears within the county council's share of the bill instead.

For 2026/27 the fire precept cap was 2.99 per cent of the previous year's Band D total. The average fire precept where it appears as a separate line is around £85 a year on Band D, ranging from roughly £55 in lower-cost services to £105 in higher-cost ones. Like the PCC precept, the fire precept is set within the cap by the constituent authority, with consultation with members but no individual right of appeal.

How the precepts scale across the bands

Because the police and fire precepts are presented as Band D figures and every other band is a statutory proportion of Band D, both precepts scale by band. On the average English bill outside London the cumulative police precept adds approximately:

• £153 on Band A (six-ninths of Band D's £230)
• £179 on Band B (seven-ninths)
• £204 on Band C (eight-ninths)
• £230 on Band D
• £281 on Band E (eleven-ninths)
• £332 on Band F (thirteen-ninths)
• £383 on Band G (fifteen-ninths)
• £460 on Band H (eighteen-ninths)

The fire precept (where it appears separately) scales the same way. A Band H household with both a £230 police precept and an £85 fire precept on Band D ends up paying around £460 for police and £170 for fire on its annual bill, separate from the council itself.

Why London has no separate police or fire precept

London council tax bills do not include separate police or fire precept lines because both services are funded through the Greater London Authority precept instead. The GLA precept, set by the Mayor of London and approved by the London Assembly, covers the Metropolitan Police Service, the London Fire Brigade, Transport for London (the relevant share), and the London-wide functions of the GLA itself. So a London council tax bill is structurally simpler: one council line and one GLA precept line. The City of London is the one exception, as it has its own City of London Police force funded through a separate mechanism.

Police precept per force area, 2026/27

There is significant variation across the country. Surrey Police, which serves a high-cost area with limited central grant, has historically had the highest precept per Band D in England outside London, often above £325 a year. Northumbria Police, which serves a lower-cost area with more central grant, has had the lowest at around £140. The mid-range is around £230, where the national Band D average sits.

The 2026/27 settlement saw most forces take the full £14 cap, with the few exceptions being forces granted specific permission to raise by more. The policing settlement letter from the Home Secretary, published in late January each year, contains the per-force funding and cap allocations and is the authoritative source for the specific figures.

Interaction with discounts and exemptions

Every council tax discount applies to the entire gross bill, including the police and fire precepts. A 25 per cent single occupant discount on the average Band D bill takes the police precept from £230 to £172.50, the fire precept from £85 to £63.75, and the council itself from around £1,910 to £1,432.50. Council tax reduction, the disabled-band reduction, and the severe mental impairment disregard all work the same way.

There is no separate exemption for the police or fire precepts, and no separate appeal route. If you disagree with the precept level, the remedy is to engage with the consultation cycle, the police and crime panel, or the local elections (PCCs are elected every four years; fire authorities are constituted from local councillors elected on the normal council cycle).

For more on bill components

The police and fire precepts are two of several lines on a typical English council tax bill outside London. The others are the council itself, the adult social care precept (for upper-tier authorities), and any parish or town precept. In London the structure is consolidated under the Greater London Authority precept. For the full picture of what the council itself spends on, see what council tax pays for.