Forum Brief: Council tax

Wednesday 18th February 2004 at 00:00
Forum Brief: Council tax

Former transport secretary Stephen Byers is to argue on Thursday that businesses are paying too little in council tax.

As the debate over the future of local authority finance rages, the close Downing Street ally will argue that pensioners and the poor are subsidising firms under "unfair" tax arrangements.

Forum Response: Help the Aged

Richard Wilson, incomes policy officer at Help the Aged told ePolitix.com: "Council tax rises of this magnitude, dwarfing the rises that older people have seen in their state or private pensions, will be the final straw for many. There is real anger among those who are on fixed incomes and are liable for the tax, who are seeing their quality of life whittled away by above-inflation rises. The irony is that many of these are the same people who are being encouraged to claim Pension Credit in order to be rewarded for saving for retirement, and who are seeing any benefit immediately wiped out.
 
"We are already witnessing civil disobedience by older people who are refusing to pay the tax in full and who are prepared to take the consequences. While Help the Aged cannot condone their illegal action, we do understand what is motivating them. There is such a deep sense of injustice that the government must act quickly to reform Council tax and to reform it in such a way as to reflect the concerns of those older people who must pay it. This means reforming Council Tax Benefit (CTB) as well. Take-up of CTB is still lamentably low and getting it to those who qualify must be a priority."
 
Forum Response: Institute of Directors
 
James Walsh, parliamentary adviser at the IoD, told ePolitix.com:"Stephen Byers is approaching the problem from the wrong end. The root cause of soaring Council tax bills is waste and inefficiency in our local authorities, not the structure of the business rate system. Only this week we heard that Sir Peter Gershon has identified £15 billion of potential public sector savings - much of it from local government. Instead of imposing a greater share of local government bills on business, policy-makers should be looking for ways to get a tighter grip on runaway town hall spending."
 
Forum Response: British Retail Consortium
 

Nigel Smith, BRC director of corporate social responsibility, said: "Retailers pay over £4bn per annum in business rates - a quarter of all collected and more than their fair share. Furthermore, this is set to rise by at least 11 per cent in 2005.