Local Government Finance Bill
Debate between Baroness Meacher and Lord Lucas
Lord Lucas
My Lords, I find myself in happy agreement with the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson of Balmacara. People should pay their debts, and I imagine that the Minister will join me in looking at things that way too. It is a good basis for looking at this amendment. However, I support the amendment, particularly because of my view of what local authorities are getting up to.
Baroness Meacher
Where errors have been made by officials, most particularly, it is completely immoral to turn on the recipient family, couple or individual and expect them to deal with what can be an enormous debt, about which they have no knowledge whatever. It is not their fault. We need to be careful about saying that in all circumstances people should pay their debts.
Lord Lucas
My Lords, I think that the noble Baroness misunderstands me. I was picking up on what the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, said and the way in which he described that this should be done. I am not trying to address myself to the particular circumstances of that part of the amendment. I support the amendment, by and large, but I am looking at it from this point of view: when I read this, I see an instrument for getting local authorities to behave better than they do and to pay more attention to their duty of care to the people to whom they are charging council tax.
About 3 million liability orders are issued in respect of council tax each year. Councils charge an average of about £100 a time for this, which is £300 million a year that councils are charging for liability orders. This charge is supposed to be based on the cost to councils of getting the liability orders and the magistrates’ court orders together. It is totally out of proportion to that cost. It is high time that the Government did a little audit to check out what one or two councils are charging and to see whether those costs are real.
It is no good, particularly when you are looking at charging money to people who often do not have it, to proceed in the same way as councils do with motorists: we all know that those charges have nothing to do with the costs of providing services, that they are completely out of proportion and that the councils are running them as a profit centre. I gather from the hornets’ nest that the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea continues to do that, which is certainly my experience from being on the wrong end of their fines. Parking has become a major profit centre for some boroughs, and I can understand why they consider that people who have cars have money to be got. However, that should not be their attitude to those who find themselves unable to pay council tax.
Lord Lucas
My Lords, I should say to the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, that I will indeed do what I can to provide her with some evidence. I should be grateful if either she or the noble Lord, Lord Tope, or anyone else who was belabouring me for being beastly to councils could point out to me where on a council’s website there are references to the sort of behaviour which they say goes on as a matter of routine. I have just looked at some; I looked in vain at Norwich, and at several others, and they all lay out the bare bones of the charges and the bailiffs and say nothing about finding your way into the care of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, or other ways in which to deal with the problems that you may have. It is not there on their websites. I cannot say that I have seen them all, but I have looked at half a dozen in the course of the winding up. I would be very grateful if those who have belaboured me could show me where on the websites of the councils with which they have involvement this sort of attitude to people who fail to pay their council tax is demonstrated. I hope that we shall manage to make some progress at Report in this direction, because it seems that there is considerable scope for not only bailiffs but councils behaving better to take care of the vulnerable but also effectively and efficiently recover council tax while causing a minimum of distress on the way. I am delighted to hear that things are better than I had understood, but I would love to see some evidence.
Baroness Meacher
My Lords, I thank the many noble Lords who have spoken in this debate so powerfully and helpfully. I must also thank the Zacchaeus 2000 Trust and the reverend Paul Nicholson, who has been behind all this.
Important points were made in this debate, albeit that, as I mentioned in our meeting with the Minister, this is a probing amendment raised in the context of the DWP and the MoJ. The point was to bring to Ministers’ notice the relationship between the three departments and the similar issues that apply, whatever words one might use. I certainly agree that the amendment does not deal with all the problems. I particularly endorse the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, that we need a regulatory or licensing system. Ten years ago, when I was chairman of the Security Industry Authority, I pressed hard, as far as I could at that stage, for such a regulatory system for bailiffs. Often they say it takes 10 years before an idea comes to fruition, so this is about time for the regulation of bailiffs. I am sure that it was raised 20 years ago, and, no doubt, 30 years ago, but there we go. It is certainly time that that was done.
I also very strongly support what was said about advice agencies. It is in no one’s interest that advice agencies are being cut back now. I appeal to the Minister to do anything that she can to ring-fence or support local advice agencies and prevent the totally destructive withdrawal of funds from those bodies. Of course, as the noble Lord, Lord Smith, said, local authorities need to collect the money, but they seem to be spending an awful lot of money on trying to do so, which again is self-destructive.
I understand the Minister’s comments, but we need this looked at across the three key departments—there may be others—to see whether sensible regulations can be drawn up. As has been said, guidance is fine, but it is not mandatory. We would like mandatory provisions within regulations that cover the collection of debts from those families and individuals who are in financial hardship and where some injustice is being done.
Having said all that, and hoping that we will have further discussions with the department and its officials, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.