Uralla's rates income can rise 23 per cent in 2027-28 and Glen Innes Severn's 12 per cent. For the other seven councils, IPART's new cap is 3.8 to 4.9 per cent

Each October the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal tells every NSW council how far it may lift the total it collects in ordinary rates the following year. That is the rate peg, or cap. For 2027-28, announced on 13 October, the nine councils this site covers got caps between 3.8 and 4.9 per cent. For most of them that is the number that will shape next year's rates notices. For Uralla and Glen Innes Severn it is not, because a rise above the cap was approved for them in June and runs through 2027-28. In IPART's words, The special variation annual increase replaces the rate peg.

The cap, and a special rise, limit a council's total general income, not any one bill. How that total is shared between residential, business and farmland ratepayers is the council's decision when it adopts its revenue policy each June.

Rises above the cap approved by IPART, New England's nine councils, 2023-24 to 2028-29

A filled column is a year with an approved special rise, drawn to scale (the tallest is 43 per cent). The 2027-28 column shows every council's number: its approved rise where it has one, otherwise IPART's new cap, in grey.

Approved special rate rises by council and year, per cent, with each council's 2027-28 figure

Council	23-24	24-25	25-26	26-27	27-28	28-29
Uralla				28.5	23.0
Glen Innes Severn				21.5	12.0	9.0
Tenterfield	43				4.9
Gwydir					4.9
Walcha	36.5	8.0	7.0		4.6
Armidale Regional	16.67	16.67	16.66		3.9
Inverell					3.9
Liverpool Plains	18.1				3.9
Tamworth Regional		18.5	15.0		3.8

Uralla: a 4.8 per cent cap it will not use

Uralla's own 2027-28 cap is 4.8 per cent, among the highest in the region, because IPART added a 0.9 point population factor for a shire growing faster than its rates base. It does not apply. In June IPART approved Uralla Shire Council's application for a permanent rise of 58.06 per cent over two years: 28.5 per cent in 2026-27 and 23 per cent in 2027-28. The council's 2026-27 budget was built on the full first step, and on 23 June councillors adopted the special rate variation rate structure, 7 votes to 2.

The council's application, as set out in IPART's report, projected the average residential rate at $940 in 2026-27 and $1,150 in 2027-28, the average business rate at $861 then $1,053, and the average farmland rate at $6,152 then $7,530. Those were projections under the rating structure the council then had, and that structure is the live question. IPART found that with the rise the council's average residential and business rates would sit below those of comparable councils, while its average farmland rates would be higher. Over the five years before the application, IPART calculated, Uralla's average residential rates grew 1.1 per cent a year and farmland rates 4.5 per cent, against an average cap of 3.4 per cent. When the 2026-27 budget came back to council, its report summarised submissions by and in support of NSW Farmers as concerned that the plan put an inequitable and increasing burden on rural landholders.

The same resolution that adopted the rate structure committed the council to review it, with community consultation, in order to inform the future draft 2027-2028 rating structure. The minutes for July, August and September record no further decision on it.

Glen Innes Severn: 12 per cent, after a vote against spreading it

IPART approved Glen Innes Severn Council's permanent rise of 48.3 per cent over three years: 21.5 per cent in 2026-27, 12.0 per cent in 2027-28 and 9.0 per cent in 2028-29. It also approved higher minimum rates for residential and business properties, $774 in 2026-27, $867 in 2027-28 and $945 in 2028-29, up from $637. On the council's figures in IPART's report, the average residential rate goes from $1,249 in 2026-27 to $1,399 in 2027-28, the average business rate from $2,606 to $2,919, and the average farmland rate from $4,445 to $4,977. The shire's own 2027-28 cap, had it applied, would have been 4.0 per cent.

When IPART announced its June decisions, its chair noted that councils can take the approved increase more slowly. This includes the possibility of deferring these changes for up to ten years, as well as deciding how rates are set for different categories of ratepayers. At Glen Innes Severn's 18 June meeting an amendment proposed exactly that: to implement the 48.3 per cent through annual compounded increases of about 4.03 per cent over ten years, rather than applying increases of 21.5%, 12% and 9% over three years. It was lost 4 votes to 2, and the council levied the 21.5 per cent. The council is also answering a draft performance improvement order from the state, which we reported on 2 October; its submission on that order cites the approved rise.

The seven on the cap

Gwydir and Tenterfield share the region's highest cap, 4.9 per cent, higher than 109 of the state's 128 councils, and in both the extra comes from a one-point population factor. For Tenterfield it is still lower than this year's 5.1 per cent: it is one of 19 councils whose cap fell. Armidale Regional, Inverell and Liverpool Plains sit at 3.9 per cent.

Walcha's 4.6 per cent comes without any population factor. Its core cap is higher than all but four councils', mainly because IPART classes it as rural, one of 15 such councils, and gave rural councils the largest new allowance for cybersecurity: 1.18 points, against 0.67 for large rural councils such as Uralla and Glen Innes Severn. IPART's paper reports its consultant's finding that rural councils require a larger percentage adjustment because cybersecurity costs represent a greater share of their general income than for other council groups, and puts the cost at about $6.50 in 2027-28 on that group's average residential rate of $550.

Tamworth Regional's 3.8 per cent is the region's lowest, and only four councils in the state have a lower one. Tamworth's population grew 0.53 per cent in IPART's measure, but supplementary valuations, the rates from new and subdivided land, grew 0.91 per cent, so IPART added no population factor. The cap is still more than its own plan expected: the general fund scenario in the Long Term Financial Plan adopted on 22 September assumed rate rises of 2.5 per cent a year for the three years after 2026-27, which we reported on 8 October.

Our view

The rate peg is the figure IPART announces and the one that makes the news each October, but in New England it is less and less the figure that sets rates. Two of the nine councils are on approved rises for 2027-28, and five more had special rises approved for years between 2023-24 and 2025-26. That looks like a regional pattern rather than nine separate stories, and IPART's chair raised the wider question in 2023, asking whether that year's large applications reinforced the case for an independent look at how councils are funded. For Glen Innes Severn the 2027-28 decision has been made: the slower path was put to a vote and lost. For Uralla the 23 per cent is settled, but the more consequential choice for many ratepayers is still open: how the council divides it between farms, homes and businesses. That review is where Uralla ratepayers can still change their 2027-28 bill, and the council has not yet said when it will consult.

What to watch

Uralla's rating structure review and its consultation. Each council's draft 2027-28 budget and revenue policy; Uralla's draft for this year went to council on 28 April 2026. Any council that wants a rise above its cap for 2027-28 must apply to IPART by early February 2027.

Sources

Method. Researched and drafted with AI, straight from the primary sources below. How The Current works.

1. IPART, Final rate pegs and components for all councils, 2027-28 (spreadsheet, read 13 October 2026): each council's core cap, cybersecurity adjustment, change in population, supplementary valuations, population factor and final cap.
2. IPART, Final rate pegs and components for all councils, 2026-27 (spreadsheet, read 13 October 2026): this year's caps.
3. IPART, Information Paper: Rate pegs for NSW councils for 2027-28 (13 October 2026): the cybersecurity adjustment by council group, Table 2 and section 4.4.3 (pages 10 and 11), and the application deadline for special variations.
4. IPART, IPART Decisions on Council Special Variation Applications (media release, 2 June 2026, read 14 October 2026): the chair's statement on deferral, Table 2 (Glen Innes Severn and Uralla) and Table 3 (Glen Innes Severn's minimum rates).
5. IPART, Uralla Shire Council Special Variation Application 2026-27, Final Report (June 2026, read 14 October 2026): the summary of the decision and comparison with comparable councils (pages 7 and 8), Table 2.1 (page 14), Table 6.1 average rates (page 42) and the five-year rate history (page 44).
6. IPART, Glen Innes Severn Council Special Variation and Minimum Rate Application 2026-27, Final Report (June 2026, read 14 October 2026): Table 2.1 (page 16) and Table 6.1 average rates (page 48).
7. Glen Innes Severn Council, Minutes, Ordinary Council Meeting, 18 June 2026 (read 14 October 2026): item 7.3, the amendment and division, and resolution 5.06/26 (pages 9 to 12).
8. Uralla Shire Council, Minutes, Ordinary Council Meeting, 23 June 2026 (read 14 October 2026): item 13.2, resolution 104.06/26 and the vote (pages 5 and 6).
9. Uralla Shire Council, Business Agenda, Ordinary Council Meeting, 23 June 2026 (read 14 October 2026): item 13.2, the summary of submissions on the draft 2026-27 Operational Plan (pages 20 and 21). The budget's assumption of the full 28.5 per cent is in the item's attachment 6 (attachments, page 232).
10. IPART, IPART Decisions on 17 Council Special Variation Applications (media release, 15 June 2023, read 14 October 2026): Table 1 (Armidale Regional, Liverpool Plains, Tenterfield, Walcha) and the chair's comments on the financial model for councils.
11. IPART, IPART Decisions on Council Special Variation Applications (media release, 14 May 2024, read 14 October 2026): Table 1 (Tamworth Regional).
12. IPART, IPART Decisions on Council Special Variation Applications (media release, 16 May 2025, read 14 October 2026): none of the nine councils applied in that round.
13. Tamworth Regional Council, Long Term Financial Plan 2026/2027 to 2035/2036, Annexure 1 to item 8.2, Ordinary Council Annexures, 22 September 2026 (read 8 October 2026): the general fund scenario's rate assumptions (page 16 of 50).

How we did this

We downloaded IPART's 2026-27 and 2027-28 rate peg workbooks and its information paper on 13 October 2026, and its four most recent rounds of special variation decisions, with the two final reports for 2026-27, on 14 October. Caps are IPART's final figures rounded to one decimal place, as it publishes them; the rankings against the state's 128 councils, the count of 19 councils whose cap fell and the count of 15 rural councils are our counts from the two workbooks. “Seven of the nine” counts the councils with a special variation approved, in full or in part, in IPART's decisions for 2023-24, 2024-25, 2025-26 and 2026-27; we did not look at earlier rounds or at the one-off additional special variations of 2022-23. An approval is a maximum: we checked that Glen Innes Severn and Uralla levied their 2026-27 steps in full (their June minutes and Uralla's budget papers) and that their minutes for July to September record no change, but we did not check how the other five councils levied their earlier approvals. The average rates for Uralla and Glen Innes Severn are each council's projections as published in IPART's reports, not bills. We did not contact the councils for this piece. The “our view” section is opinion based on the documents described.