Council Tax Issue

thewrongtrousers

Firstly apologies if this in the wrong place, I would have put it in the CAB thread but this is now closed and I couldn't find anywhere else suitable.

The issue concerns Council Tax and my mother in law.

About 10 years ago she divorced her husband who has severe MS and he stayed in their jointly owned house but it was subject to a 'Martins Order'. Under the Martins Order her ex-husband is liable for upkeep of the property and all bills inc council tax.
A few years later she remarried and then 2 years ago she separated from her second husband and came to live with us for a while (we live 100's of miles away), after a few months she moved out and into a flat where she currently resides.

Last week the house she owned with her ex-husband sold and they divided the money.

Yesterday we received at our address a letter for a court order for payment of the council tax for the house in question. The payment period is April 2016 to April 2017. There are additional fees for the court order. This is the first letter we have received for her regarding this matter.

Obviously this is worrying her quite a bit, she is quite elderly now.

We can't understand why she is being charged this or any council tax, as her previous husband was responsible for all the bills under the terms of the Martins Order.

Her ex-husband is being very unhelpful and the Council say she is liable, but won't expand on this even though their records clearly show she has not paid council tax on the property for over 10 years. They won't accept a copy of the Martins Order. A round trip journey for the court appearance will cost £200+ and take around 15 hours.

What are our options? Do we have any? Any help or advice would be appreciated.

CIS

Council tax legislation specifies what they call the 'hierarchy of liability' (S(6) of the LGFA 1992) which defines who is liable for council tax on the property. Whilst the ex-husband was resident in the property then he falls as the liable party for council tax purposes under the hierarchy of liability however once it was un-occupied both joint owners are liable for the council tax charge.

Council Tax legislation does not allow for anything other than what is specified in the legislation to affect liability - no account is made for any court orders or similar so the council has no powers to take it in to account.

As it stands - your mother would be jointly liable for the council tax and would then need to take seperate legal action against her ex-husband to recover the money from him.

The only way you could dispute the legal liability on the property is by way of a Valuation Tribunal but again they have no real powers under legislation to consider it (as it isn't covered in legislation) so it would ultimately have to be a high court case to push a binding verdict on whether a court order affects liability.

National_Debtline

Hi

Following on from the post from CIS it sounds like your mother-in-law will need some legal advice. She can check whether she can access a solicitor for free through the following organisations:

www.lawcentres.org.uk

www.lawworks.org.uk

James
@natdebtline

molerat

OP, you need to expand on who, if anyone, was resident from April this year.

CIS

Yesterday we received at our address a letter for a court order for payment of the council tax for the house in question. The payment period is April 2016 to April 2017.

I would also check that the council are aware of the date of sale.

CIS

In circa 10 years it's not a query I've had come up before.

Out of curiosity I had a look through the VT decisions to see what the general flow they were taking and it is, as I expected, in line with section 6 of the LGFA 1992.

http://info.valuation-tribunals.gov.uk/decision_document.asp?appeal=/decision_documents/documents/CT_England/2355M84474134C.htm&Decision=liability
Although a slightly different type of court order the actual liability argument is along the same lines. Decision points 6-11 are the salient ones.

http://info.valuation-tribunals.gov.uk/decision_document.asp?appeal=/decision_documents/documents/CT_England/4625M84833221C.htm&Decision=liability
Although a slightly different type of court order the actual liability argument is along the same lines. Decision points8-13 are the salient ones.