To be cranky about the £150 council tax rebate

[Notcontent]

I have been thinking a lot about this. I understand that the government was looking for a way to implement help with energy costs in the easiest way possible and that doing it through council tax bands seemed sensible as for the most part it does target the right people. But only for the most part. For example, in London there are lots of people who live in high value properties that are actually far from luxurious and who will miss out. For example, my elderly neighbour will miss out even though he deserves the help. He doesn’t have a lot of money - bought his house decades ago when the area was very cheap and lives very frugally. I know councils will get some extra money to distribute but that will be for only a small number of people.

These kinds of injustices really get to me, as I think when it comes to public money everyone should get equal treatment.

For those of you saying you dob't need it ,go buy £150 pounds worth of food and donate it or something to help others out
The easiest and I guess cheapest way to do it was to do what they have, generally speaking those in lower incomes will benefit

[quote Porcupineintherough]@Tealightsandd oh bollocks, of course your house is an asset and forms part of your wealth. He doesnt even have to sell it, he can release equity if he's short of cash. And be bloody glad he's got the option.[/quote]
What's bollocks is that loads of elderly frail people can just sell their home - that they live in...not only be physically and mentally fit enough to do so but also magically find an accessible home to move into.

London pensioners have really been fucked over haven't they. More than anywhere else in the country, they've had to see their children and grandchildren priced away from family, community, and support network. And London is the worse place for this. There are 10-15 year waiting lists for social housing in London, and despite the social cleansing of London families and vulnerable individuals that has been going on for years, two thirds of all of England's homeless families are in London. They are the children and grandchildren of London pensioners.

Meanwhile families in the north east still get to live close to each other - they have their support networks and communities. Because housing is affordable, with also a lot more social rented availability.

London pensioners are the poorest pensioners in the UK. Add in losing their family and community support networks (priced out). And now they're expected to lose their home too.... despite there being few smaller and/or accessible options to move into.

Meanwhile public services for the huge numbers of deprived Londoners (including many pensioners) are often shit and seriously lacking.

Londoners (of all ages) have been fucked over for decades. About time they got something for once. Because it sure as hell isn't their fault that other people from the rest of the country moved to London and pushed up the house prices. Nobody has suffered more than Londoners from that.

Why should elderly people in the north east get to keep their homes and stay living close to their families, communities, and support networks(who can more easily afford to buy and/or have easier access to social housing), but London pensioners aren't allowed the same? Goodness, now they're not even allowed just one of those!

For anybody but particularly the elderly (and vulnerable), being around your family, community, and support network is something that is invaluable and priceless.

@ivykaty44

Council tax is also not reassessed when value is added to a property

it can be requested to the valuation office

It’s not automatic though is it? So yes it can happen but I doubt there’s an enormous queue of people applying to the council to pay more tax

@Tealightsandd they don't need to move, they can do equity release on their property.

I’m not annoyed about the council tax rebate but now I’ve just realised the impact of the energy loan I’m super pissed off about that. So we will have £40 added to our monthly bill, our monthly DD is currently £47! We are on a fix until May so if we come off that and the price doubles, by the time we reach October our bill will roughly triple due to the levy. And no way to opt out

@Tealightsandd

London pensioners are the poorest pensioners in the UK. Add in losing their family and community support networks (priced out). And now they're expected to lose their home too.... despite there being few smaller and/or accessible options to move into.

Meanwhile public services for the huge numbers of deprived Londoners (including many pensioners) are often shit and seriously lacking.

Londoners (of all ages) have been fucked over for decades. About time they got something for once. Because it sure as hell isn't their fault that other people from the rest of the country moved to London and pushed up the house prices. Nobody has suffered more than Londoners from that.

I realise this might be a case of 'the grass is greener' but Londoners being fucked over? Ha ha ha ha, er, no.

Why don't you have a look at investment per capita in public services, culture, transport, jobs, schools and just about everything else in London compared with the rest of the country if you think that people who have housing wealth often well into the millions are poor, deprived and fucked over.

At least if you have that housing wealth it gives you options not available to people in 'the north' such as equity release or downsizing. Hell, you could even sell your London property and buy an entire street for your extended family in some places.

tea we can easily manage without our child benefit though. Which shows that the system works. Us being given free money we didn't 'need' was wrong. It can be better distributed elsewhere.
What was annoying was not losing the benefit at all, but the fact that other benefits (such as the fuel allowance, prescriptions etc) aren't dished out out according to need but simply depending on your date of birth!
Allowances removed from pensioners deemed not to need them could then bump up those received by those genuinely struggling.

@Tealightsandd

London pensioners are the poorest pensioners in the UK. Add in losing their family and community support networks (priced out). And now they're expected to lose their home too.... despite there being few smaller and/or accessible options to move into.

Meanwhile public services for the huge numbers of deprived Londoners (including many pensioners) are often shit and seriously lacking.

Londoners (of all ages) have been fucked over for decades. About time they got something for once. Because it sure as hell isn't their fault that other people from the rest of the country moved to London and pushed up the house prices. Nobody has suffered more than Londoners from that.

Bullshit. Look at the investment per capita and all the cheap public resources pumped into London compared to the rest of the UK. If you think public services in London are shit, then you'll get a shock if you experience what they are like in the rest of the UK

And yes, an old person in the NE might not move, but their younger working age family may well have to, to get a well paid job.

I’ve just realised the impact of the energy loan I’m super pissed off about that. So we will have £40 added to our monthly bill, our monthly DD is currently £47! We are on a fix until May so if we come off that and the price doubles, by the time we reach October our bill will roughly triple due to the levy. And no way to opt out
It won't be added on monthly though, it'll be £40 a year for 5 years.

It won't be added on monthly though, it'll start at £40 a year for 5 years

corrected it for you.

@Billandben444

I’ve just realised the impact of the energy loan I’m super pissed off about that. So we will have £40 added to our monthly bill, our monthly DD is currently £47! We are on a fix until May so if we come off that and the price doubles, by the time we reach October our bill will roughly triple due to the levy. And no way to opt out It won't be added on monthly though, it'll be £40 a year for 5 years.

Ah that’s not as bad then, I misread. But still very unhelpful for those with small bills like us as the £200 will screw up the DD. Not hugely helpful to people whose setup is non standard either as I’m guessing you can’t use it on bottled gas etc.

Some figures that you may find interesting:

Percentage of households in bands A-D (who will receive £150)

95 - Tyne & Wear
89 - Yorkshire & Humber
69 - London
52 - Surrey
32 - Kensington & Chelsea

@Tealightsandd of course his house is an asset. In London a massively expensive asset that he likely paid buttons for. If he doesn’t want to downsize for some reason he can equity release. We absolutely should not be giving tax rebates to millionaires.

Are you Helena Dove?

@Cocomarine

🤣 I can find plenty more people to feel sorry for than those that own their house outright!

Oh yes. Me too

Not sure if anyone linked that already but from government website : On top of this discount, discretionary funding of £144 million will also be provided to support vulnerable people and individuals on low incomes that do not pay Council Tax, or that pay Council Tax for properties in Bands E-H.

R4 moneybox earlier had someone from the CAB talking about the lower council tax bands, the rebate and benefit recipients.

They said people receiving council tax support (so who receive a council tax bill which is then partly or fully covered by CTS) should automatically receive the rebate. The method of payment is yet to be confirmed.

People exempt from council tax in the first place (those who receive a £0 council tax bill, so receive no CTS as there's no bill to cover- eg full time students) will have to apply for a discretionary payment via their council.

Bit less worried now if that's correct as I've been panicking about having to apply, but it looks like I fall in the first group (fortunately for me).

In regard to your elderly neighbour - he should have sold before he was too infirm to withstand the upheaval. There are 84 million empty bedrooms in the UK, 2/3 of them are owned outright by the over 65s. In the 1960s they purchase said bedrooms for 2 years wages. One person’s two years of wages!

It now takes TWO workers 10 years to build a deposit and 40 years to pay off the mortgage.

The reason old people should move out of too-large houses, is that we do not have an unlimited amount of land, or number of houses available to safely house the population. People are literally homeless, because of selfish people who refuse to downsize. I feel very sorry for them. If your house is too big for you, sell it.

The reason we have some people who own absolutely nothing, never will build any wealth, and are going to remain on the breadline for their entire lives with never a decent place to live, is partly because the over 65s are hoarding a large proportion of our wealth. It needs to trickle down far sooner than when they die at 86 - where it is split, uselessly, and far too-late, between c.40 relatives.

Yet there is some of us that won’t get any help.
We firstly got left out of the covid uplift because we’re on the old system.
Now this so called energy help. That is of no help at all.
My single disabled son gets pip and esa - his council tax is covered by council tax support - his energy bills have rocketed since npower being moved to eon. No help for him, no rebate for him.
He would be severely worse off if he changed to universal credit.
My widowed elderly disabled mother in law. - yet again no help for her, no rebate.
Myself. I’m disabled, my husband a carer with 2 disabled children in the home as well. We get council tax support - so no rebate, no help.
Our council tax is going up to which I now have to find the extra to cover that, on top of everything else going up.

If I couldnt afford to pay my council tax when sitting in a million pound house I would sell it and rent a really nice place, even paying £2000 a month for a 1 bed apartment would pay the rent for 40+ years, a million pounds would be more than enough to keep you for the rest of your life when you are your 80s. And you wouldnt have to turn the heating down or eat crap food.

I do agree with you OP. Council tax was a stop gap after the poll tax, literally was my dad and his council pals going out in the car and rating the size of houses.
At a time when house prices werw not insane luke now. Bigger houses are more expensive to morgage and are more expensive to heat. We are fortunate to have 4 bedrooms, so band E. In this part of scotland that's over 2.8k on an average income with rising energy costs its going to be brutal for us! The whole taxation system needs overhauled...

[quote rookiemere]@Tealightsandd they don't need to move, they can do equity release on their property.[/quote]
So you think people should have to pay to be in a position to be able to pay their council tax? Equity release isn’t free, and it’s only an option towards the end of people’s lives when they’re not far off having to pay a colossal amount of of death tax anyway.

Maybe the government could offer free equity release for people in this position and that way they get to protect the amount they get when the person dies.

It’s also worth considering that not everyone who lives in a high value property with a low income is elderly. Other people in that position are likely to be single parents who got a house out of a divorce or people who have had a significant bereavement like the premature death of a parent or spouse. Their properties are only up to band D anyway, it’s not like we’re talking about mansions. To me, it just seems nasty to begrudge people a tiny bit of help in those circumstances.

There are so many anomalies - when I bought my 3 bed house it had a small extension, roughly 12 x 12, at the time council tax was set. That pushed it into band E, every other house in the road, band D (even though their plots were bigger than ours).

30 years on, every other house in the road has had at least one bedroom added, wrap around extensions etc., plus their larger plot, means that where my band E house might be worth £400k, my neighbours in band D could realise £500k+ if they sold. We've applied twice to be re-banded without success. I've shrugged it off for so many years but now there are many very wealthy people in this road with what are now huge houses and its really got to me; I'm already paying nearly £400 a year more in tax than my neighbours.

Bit shit really.

you are not being unreasonable. You are a kind caring person who understands.