Tories & Lib Dems launch council tax plans

The Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats have both unveiled plans to tackle council tax.

The Conservatives have pledged to cancel Labour’s planned revaluation of homes in England for the council tax. Party leader Michael Howard described it as Labour’s “latest stealth tax” and said that it would result in seven million homes moving into a higher council tax band.

The Liberal Democrats have pledged to abolish council tax and replace it with a local income tax, based on the ability to pay.

Commenting on council tax at an election press conference, Mr Howard said that scrapping the revaluation would save millions of homeowners an average of £270 per year.

Mr Howard said: “While he (Mr Blair) has talked, families have been struggling – last year, for the first time in a decade, their average incomes fell thanks to Mr Blair’s stealth taxes. Most people will have just opened their council tax bills with horror. Well, my message to them is clear: you don’t have to settle for this. You can make a difference. You can vote to stop the relentless rise in council tax.”

The Conservatives announced a five-point plan in order to reduce council tax. Aside from the scrapping of the revaluation, the plans include: abolishing regulations to ease burdens on councils; introducing greater transparency over grant distribution; and halving council tax bills for the elderly by reducing the charge on adults aged 65 and over by up to £500 per year.

Labour’s election co-ordinator Alan Milburn slammed Mr Howard’s pledge to scrap council tax revaluation, branding it as a “desperate act of opportunism”. He said: “A week ago Mr Howard said he was going ahead with revaluation. Now, as his campaign falters, he changes course. If you vote Tory on May 5, you get higher council tax bills straight away because of the cuts they’re making to central government’s grant to local councils.”

The Liberal Democrats have also criticised the revaluation process, but they attacked Conservative promises to reduce pensioner's council tax bills. The party’s local government spokesperson, Ed Davey said: “Council tax is fundamentally unfair. It’s been unfair since it was introduced by the Conservatives in 1993.

“The revaluation process underway will push up bills for people in property hotspots by 20% or more. And we know that less than half of pensioners would get any help with council tax bills from the Conservatives – and of those who do, the richest will get more than the poorest. Council tax is bad and will get worse unless we scrap it now.”

The Liberal Democrats have claimed that their proposed local income tax would make the average household better off by over £450 per year. The party also claimed that six million pensioners would pay no local tax at all under the scheme and said that half of all households would be better off – although the party admitted that a quarter of households would pay more tax.

Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy said: “Council tax is the most unpopular tax in Britain today because it is fundamentally unfair and penalises pensioners and low income families. Under our plans for a local income tax, 15 million families will pay less.”

(KMcA/GB)