council tax revaluation

theGrinch

can anyone explain why a council tax revaluation means higher bills for everyone?

surely the council tax bands are relative to each other and the tax bands should then rise in line with average house prices otherwise we will all be in the higher bands (scope for a government fiddle here!). so will there will be some losers and gainers? somehow why do I feel the government will try to screw us all for more money?

who will take a stand against this?

pault123

If what their doing is valuing the houses at todays prices probably more than double what they were when the last valuations were carried out (think it was 1991?) and keeping the bandings the same which I would expect from todays money grabbings government then ill be in a very high band and my council tax will be more than doubling!

When you say take a stand against this in what way, the feeling I get at the moment with the government is you either like it or leave it. Mass riots and protests throughout the whole of the uk is the only way I can see the blinker wearing government to notice everyones opinion.

Agree its going to be a money making exercise :mad:

Paul

Ted_Hutchinson

The Campaign for the Reform of Council Tax

who will take a stand against this?

There is an alternative
Axe The Tax

The question is "What percentage of the electorate are Turkeys prepared to vote for their Xmas Stuffing?"

Milky_Mocha

I must say the thought of being charged this "local income tax" irritates me even more. "Fairer tax" huh?

This is the situation - a young penniless pupil decides to go to uni, eats beans and toast most days (KFC becomes a luxury one Saturday a month), works two jobs, one in grotty McDonalds, the other wiping a**es in a nursing home - all just to get a few pennies together, studies diligently at uni with exams, gruelling assignments and sleepless nights, finally graduating, sending out 88 applications for jobs, receiving 13 interviews and subsequently loads of rejections, putting yourself together, attending more job fairs, more applications etc etc, finally bagging a good job. Then work your socks off in the job doing unpaid overtime to meet and exceed your objectives, put your social life on hold during major projects, holding off having kids until you can comfortably support yourself and yours fully, succeeding so that you are rewarded for all your effort with a salary that finally enables you to have decent meals every day, buy a house, a car....etc etc

Then at the other end of the scale there's a stupid kid who doesn't give two hoots about her future, decides to get knocked up so she can get free accomodation and other welfare benefits(subsidised by my hard earned money), never cared about education even though it was free, skipped classes so she could be with her loser boyfriend. Eventually she gets a job which pays next to nothing due to lack of skills or qualification but hey its enough to get her the clothes, hairstyles, shoes and make-up she wants, etc etc

Under the local income tax rules the first person pays a whole grand MORE each year than he/she would have paid as council tax.
The second lazy, selfish person pays £47 (that's forty-seven pounds) tops for the year.

That's "fair"?

All I ask of my council is that if they are going to charge so much it should be seen to be going towards something - and that's not happening. It's all promises of what's going to happen but has been "going to happen" for at least three years now.

My rant is over - for now.

Justin_Credit

I must be one of the very few who was happy with the Poll Tax.

I live alone so from what I remember the Poll Tax bill for me was about a third of what I formerly paid in rates. At least with the Poll Tax if you were an adult and used local authority services, as everbody does, then you were eligible to pay. The problem was collecting it, but anyway that is all history.

This year my Council Tax banding has been reduced by one band, yippeee! Realistically though this just means that I am going to be £1 per week better off this coming year.

I hate to think how I will manage to pay when I am retired in a few years time, the 25% discount for single occupancy is not very realistic for those living on a small pension I feel.

There must be a better way.

JC

MarkyMarkD

theGrinch wrote:

can anyone explain why a council tax revaluation means higher bills for everyone?

surely the council tax bands are relative to each other and the tax bands should then rise in line with average house prices otherwise we will all be in the higher bands (scope for a government fiddle here!). so will there will be some losers and gainers? somehow why do I feel the government will try to screw us all for more money?

who will take a stand against this?

I've thought the same, Grinch.

If they revalue all the properties, and uplift the council tax bands proportionately, there's no reason why the average person will move bands or pay any more.

Some people will, of course, move up or down bands, depending on their relative house value movement compared to others in their area. But that should be marginal - typically one band either way, I should have thought.

And if the whole area moves up more than the (presumably national) bands have moved, there will be more in higher bands - which means that the tax rate in that higher band will fall to collect the same revenue.

Somehow I think that the press on this has been based on scaremongering.

dippy

Is there anybody from Wales around here? Care to share your experience? The revaluation exercise there has already happened and it's a precursor to what's going to happen across the whole of the UK.

From http://www.axethetax.org.uk/pages/rebanding-faq.html :

"Labour's finance minister in Wales, Sue Essex, promised the people of Wales that revaluation would make things fairer. Half of homes would stay in the same band, quarter would fall and quarter would rise, she said. In the end, 33% of homes have gone up a band, and only 8% have gone down.

In Cardiff, 64% of homes have gone up, with just 2% going down. Worse still, some of the worst hit wards - with as many as 90% of homes moved up - were some of the poorest."

waterbaby

Justin_Credit wrote:

I must be one of the very few who was happy with the Poll Tax.
JC

Sorry but would someone mind explaining how the poll tax worked? I thought it was a flat rate for every house but I must have misunderstood if Justin_Credit lives alone and preferred it. (As a Thatcher's child I guess I was in nappies at the time)

Also - the aim of the revaluation is to take account of changes in the relative value in houses, not to make money. Houses change in ways which alter the value relative to others (eg building extensions). If the system that CT works under says (rightly or wrongly) that the relative value of your house determines how much you pay, then the values of all houses have to be assessed from time to time.

I work with this stuff in my job; the revaluation has been planned for ages. It's not a political thing.

The following briefing from the Valuation Office Agency helps I think. I'm sorry I can't do links.

http://www.voa.gov.uk/council_tax/ct-reval-2007/feb-2005-briefing.shtml

dippy

As we've already seen in Wales, what the government promised and what really happened are a little different.

Aren't we always hearing how the councils are cash-strapped? We're going to have a council tax revaluation based on house prices that have undergone one of the best booms ever from 1991 to 2005, with cases of 300%-500% increases in house value. Anybody care to guess what will happen?

Justin_Credit

Waterbaby

As far as I remember it was a Poll Tax and not a flat rate for a household. If there were 3 members of a household eligible to vote then 3 x the Poll Tax was due. As I mentioned in the earlier post the collection of the tax was a massive problem though.

Dippy

I am living in Wales, see my earlier post about my position regards 2005-06 Council Tax and banding.

JC

waterbaby

Oh I see, so it was a flat rate per (eligible) person. I knew it ran into problems through unequal burdens etc, so that would make sense. Thanks!