Council tax will rise this year by almost £50 per bill for a band D property in the UK, a new report predicts.

A poll of 112 councils by the Local Government Association (LGA) discovered that seven out of ten were planning to increase bills by between 3.1 and five per cent.

The study indicates that average rises will be four per cent for 2006, more than twice the current 1.9 per cent rate of inflation.

Whilst the forecast council tax increases are lower than previous years, local authorities are still raising bills faster than the cost of goods and services is going up.

The LGA stresses that councils are unhappy about raising tax bills, but are being forced to by government "bureaucracy" that requires councils to ring-fence large sums of money, increased fuel costs and rising costs of caring for elderly residents.

"[There is] very little room for many authorities to manoeuvre between higher council tax and service reductions. It is a credit to local authorities that despite difficulties, councils have managed to keep increases so low," Sir Sandy Bruce-Lockhart, LGA chairman, said.