Are court 'orders' violating law?

Council tax legal battles exposing flaws in the system

- LYUBKA BUCKHURST

IN April, I sat in the county court at Norwich as a McKenzie friend toa lovely doctor who challenged her council tax ‘bills’.

She found herself the recipient of a statutory demand for over £8,000, served by South Norfolk Council.

Most people above the age of majority and living in England and Wales receive a council tax bill each year. But how many of us realise, though, that no council has the authority to send us bills?

There are many references to ‘tax bills’ on the government website, but there is no legal definition of that term in existence. It stands to reason, then, that it was never parliament's intention to authorise any public body to send you a bill. And just because councils have been doing it fora few decades does not make it right. At the hearing last week, however, a judge waved if all off as a ‘labelling issue’.

There are two pieces of legislation that councils use with respect to levying and enforcing council tax: the Local Government Finance Act (LGFA) 1992, and the Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations (CTAER) 1992.

Regulation 18 of CTAER 1992 says that the ‘billing authority’ (i.e. the council) is required to send the liable persona ‘demand notice’. Not a bill.