“6.4 million in unpaid council tax.
Oh dear the amount, 7 million, the council "gave away" to the Icelandic banks will just about pay for it.
And heare's me thinking I paid my rates so the council could clean the streets, empty my bins, supply the goodies we require to live in a decent neighbourhood. Just shows how wrong I can be?”

“Poppy - I was with you until your very last paragraph. That really is a silly suggestion, although I do appreciate your sentiments.

Council Tax is a very unfair tax as it does not take into account a person's ability to pay. As you so rightly suggest, until such a time as there is an alternative, we have to endure.

Local taxes are a necessary evil, but there ought to be a fairer way to collect them........I don't know how though.

What is infuriating is the total lack of flexibility associated with the payment itself.”

“It is no use arguing about the council tax, all of us will have to pay it at some point. I work 40 hours a week and I am on a very low wage (but I have a job, which I might add are like gold dust nowadays) I don't get any help at all so out of my wages (which are paid monthly) I am lucky to have £80 left, this calculates to £20 per week without the food bill on top. The council sent me a letter to say I owed an extra £28 on my bill and if I didn't pay on a certain date this month then I would be summoned to pay court costs etc.

Yes there are a lot of people out there who choose not to work because they get their bills paid for which is unfair on the genuine people who can not go out to work, but they ALL get painted with the same brush each and everytime something like this comes to light. The government is to blame for allowing this to happen, its not rocket science in how to deal with.

There will come a day when the government will employ a very bright spark with ideas to stop all this wasted money slipping through their hands every single day and until that day then we have to carry on.

I know, why don't the governemnt ask all the pop/film stars and the footballers to give up 1 month of their wages, and then we would be out of the resession.”

“You probably class it as another "victimless crime".”

“'crazy' wrote: "Council tax take you to court for missing one payment, no other company would do this".

I hold no brief for the Council especially the Council Tax 'recovery' department - but I don't think this is strictly true.

I know, because it happened to me a couple of years ago when I was late making a monthly payment. True, they did threaten that all sorts of doom and thunder would descend upon my head if I didn't pay up, but all I had to do was to agree to pay an adjusted amount each month in order to clear the debt.

It's only really persistent offenders who ever end up in court. Even so, personally I still believe that even *that* is morally wrong because I don't think anyone should ever be sent to prison for owing money to The State.”

“Sue, Sue, Sue - Why all the negativity? I was polite, factual and your response was so awful. You have never walked in my shoes, you couldn't. Please do not make sweeping assumptions about me, or the unemployed either.

Your comments do seem to have an edge of jealousy in them, listing all the things people are alleged to have that you could not have.

The fact still remains that the council and the courts do not seem to want to help people, BUT there are people who will not help themselves also.

And for you information, neither myself, or Annoyed form Cleethorpes are morons - we just have a different opinion to you - get over it please.”

“Right, this debt is from 8000 working / attempting to work househiolds.

This debit is generate because the council take accounts to court without giving the people chance to pay, a large amount of these are people comming out of work that year.

Council tax take you to court for missing one payment, no other company would do this.

This is done so the crazy gang can publish a indicator to the audito commission called the BVPI indicator . The crazy gang have used this HIGH BVPI figure to justify there massive wage increases over the past 6 years

want to know the real figures for council tax from our council

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/questions_for_council_tax_and_bu#comment-9608”

“p s Annoyed. From what I know of the court system it takes much longer than 4 months to get to the bailiff stage so you must have been skipping council tax payments LONG before you came out of work.”

“Devil's Advocate, Hades and Annoyed of Cleethorpes. If you took the trouble to read carefully what I put before you galloped off on your high horses you would see that I put there were benefits for those on a low income - meaning that the debt wasn't from this group.

I have walked in your shoes in the past - been out of work, on benefit for a while and on a low income for quite a few years. But I always put paying my debts before other essentials of life that I see on my estate. I can name you dozens who holiday abroad, have cars, smoke and have far more nights out on the town than my husband and I ever could hope for. All the time while being up to the eyes in debt. So pick the bones out that, morons.”

“Well I find it so hard to pay my council tax.I've got dance classes for my daughter to pay for and drama classes for my son to pay. Plus Ive also got my full HD tv package to pay for as the wife likes to watch Jeremy Kyle in full Hd on my 42" lcd HD TV that I rent as I cant be seen watching TV on an old tube tv.and I've got to have the full broadband package from virgin.So i can facebook all my friends who ive never me.On top of that Ive got the rent to pay for the washing machine( yes you can still rent them)and the HP on the wifes 6 month old vauxhall Corsa convertable she just uses for the school run and my brand new Range Rover. Then we have to pay for our flights to turkey as we will be stopping in our apartment we have there. As we need to recover from our 2 week stay in Disney Land Florida.Our mortgage payments have gone up as we have remortaged last year to pay for the decking and hot tub.Even though we have only used it once. we keep it heated all the time just in case we want to jump in it and that has put the electric bill up. Then we have the sun bed to pay and the wifes beauty treatments each week( we put the breast enlargements on the credit card she had them done in the states ) and our gym membership.So with all these important things to pay for how can you expect me to pay this sill thing called council tax.

;-)”