Worried about Council Tax increases?

[WendyS]

Guess this could equally well be posted in Home & Garden, but is everybody aware of the national compaign to protest against Council Tax increases and introduce a fairer way of paying, related to income? It is a non-party political campaign, supported by the Royal British Legion.

If not, check out the following website: IsItFair.co.uk

You can sign a petition, contact your MP, print off car stickers and sign up for e-mail updates on progress of the campaign.

[stanleyman]

I always felt that the poll tax was the fairest way by taxing individuals who use the services rather than the property. Obviously many people disagreed with this.

There already is provision for poorer people to pay less and if it were related to income this would just bring in another tier of bureaucracy and increased costs etc.

[vehelpfulguy]

The Poll tax WAS fairer. The only people who complained about it were those people who had never paid the rates / council tax and were annoyed about having to pay for things after years of getting them for nothing.

I do think the Tories should have phased in the Poll tax on a gradual basis. Get everyone registered first and get them used to paying, and then gradually increase the poll tax and reduce the rates year on year. Then we would not have had the protests.

It certainly seems silly to base a tax on the value of the house which takes into almost no account of how many people live there or how much money they may have.

A house with 11 people in it would pay the same council tax as a next door house with 2 people in it.

[buildersmate]

The problem with the Poll Tax was collecting it; people move around / disappear / are hard to track down. Property generally stays where it was built. Easier to levy a charge against.

[ianess]

There wasn't a great deal wrong with the Community Charge or Poll Tax or whatever it came to be called. I think it's a pity it was scrapped.....after all it was shouted down by people who wanted to use the system without contributing to it.
Who was it that decided you had to pay more tax on nothing more subtle than the size of your house? What a ridiculous idea that is.

[Loosehead]

Well guys I thought I was the only one who thought that the community charge was a good system. It just got torpedoed by the great unwashed who where shocked that they would now have to contribute. Council tax is much worse. You have pensioners who have the house and little else being saddled with huge bills.

Another thing is the total inefficiency of local authorities who seem to spend fortunes on trendy psuedo jobs just to prove how PC they are. Not to mention thousands of councillers on the gravy train. If a private company ran like a local authority they'd be down the loo quicker than you could say, diversity consultant.

I'm rapidly coming around to the local income tax idea but I'm worried it's just another percentage to keep hiking up.

[WoWo]

While I agree there needs to some means testing, why if you earn more should you have to pay more?

The council tax is for services which the local authority provide, collecting rubbish, keeping the streets clean, Policing etc etc

So why, just because somebody earns more, should they pay more for the same service that everybody else gets. As a higher rate tax payer they already pay more tax into the system.

Would it be fair if general goods were priced the same way, so if you earn �10k pa you pay 50p for a pint of milk but if you earn �20k you pay �1 a pint.

I'm not saying there shouldn't be schemes in place for people who have trouble paying, pensioners being the prime example.

[Miss Zippy]

I also agree that the poll tax was an inherently fairer system and I certainly don't agree with any form of local income tax to replace the current system. Whilst I sympathise with pensioners who struggle to pay the tax, I also sympathise with younger people who though appearing to be earning well for their age (earning, say, �40k plus), are struggling to get on the property ladder and pay off student debt. They shouldn't be hit even harder by a second income related tax.

[Gef]

I pay income tax (some of it at 40%) and I can accept that. However, why should I pay more council tax than my neighbour (who lives in an identical flat) just because I earn more?