Have I missed out on a tax reduction?
Labour’s Iain Malcolm in odd statement
Cllr. Iain Malcolm, Labour’s Leader of South Tyneside District council is quoted today as saying:
“We have been able to reduce council tax year on year since I become leader.”
Has a year been missed out of my life? Have I been in a state of cryogenic suspended animation on another planet? Did they deliberately miss me out?
I have lived in South Shields all of my life, and as far as I can recall during the history of paying council tax on South Tyneside my bill has only ever gone up (or last year stayed the same thanks to the Coalition government), can someone please tell me which year during Iain Malcolm’s leadership that it was reduced?
Every time that South Tyneside Council had a “consultation exercise” on its website about council taxes I was offered a choice of four different levels of increases, never once was I offered the choice of a freeze or a reduction.
Has the “dear Leader” been terribly misquoted or has he become temporarily deluded into thinking he has become a tax cutting Tory after successfully squeezing the council’s budget?
:: 
:: 
:: 
:: 
:: 
:: 
:: 
:: 
:: 
:: 
:: 
I agree, I have been paying rates / community charge / council tax in South Tyneside since 1976 and cannot recall a single year in which they reduced, indeed, last year is the first time I recall them even satying the same! Like you I have taken part in the “consultation, only to find I am presented with a list of option to increase spending, never an option to maintain the status quo or have a reduction.
Ken
January 27, 2012 at 3:35 pm