Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

[Adamna]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

I would love to be a fly on the wall at one of these: http://www.irrv.net/conferences/meeting.asp?Mid=1586















.

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

I would love to be a fly on the wall at one of these: http://www.irrv.net/conferences/meeting.asp?Mid=1586

My immediate thoughts were that the course would serve to inform billing authorities how to get round the judgment and continue claiming the same level of costs. I don't know? I could be wrong.

[Adamna]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

I would love to be a fly on the wall at one of these: http://www.irrv.net/conferences/meeting.asp?Mid=1586

There are still places left on 20 July at Peterborough? Looking at booking in to the London one on 21 July. They have a 3 for 2 offer if you phone them.

- - - Updated - - -

My immediate thoughts were that the course would serve to inform billing authorities how to get round the judgment and continue claiming the same level of costs. I don't know? I could be wrong.

Of course it will be. Best to know in advance what the dirty tricks will be, from the inside.

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

From: outlawlgo
To: headofoffice@jaco.gsi.gov.uk
Sent: August 08, 2015
Subject: Fw: Advisory Committee complaint 2 Sept 2014

Dear Sir/Madam

I wish to escalate a complaint to the Judicial Appointment and Conduct Ombudsman which was initially submitted to the Advisory Committee for Humber & South Yorks on 2 September 2014.

The complaint has never been acknowledged and several enquiries have been made as to why correspondence has been ignore. All efforts to elicit a response have been unsuccessful.

I have briefly visited the Judicial Appointments & Conduct Ombudsman website and believe maybe this process requires the completion of an application form. I have not looked any further into this purely for the reason that every 'proper' procedure I have followed so far (protracting over several years) has led to a dead-end.

You may appreciate that I am keen for the hoops through which I'm being made to jump are kept to as few as possible to reach a satisfactory conclusion. I therefore hope this email, attachment and brief history of email communications will be sufficient to get an investigation underway.

Yours sincerely

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

Update.

No acknowledgement from the Judicial Appointments and Conduct Ombudsman to the email sent on 8 August 2015. A reminder sent today. I can see this being just another state sponsored organisation attempting to fake accountability.

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

The attempts of raising concerns about the dysfunctional justice system through proper channels have been futile. Both the Advisory Committee for Humber & South Yorkshire and then the Judicial Appointment and Conduct Ombudsman have stonewalled the complaints, implications for which in my mind should be criminal. However, where the proper channels have failed, another avenue has presented itself that should prove difficult for the authorities to ignore.

As of the 27 August 2015 I have been under arrest (currently on bail) for trumped-up charges, the minutiae of which I won't go into here. Humberside police incidentally falsely imprisoned me for several hours approximately from 6pm to 2am the following morning. I learned on 4 August that the contrived evidence, which could implicate the arresting officer with perjury, was dismissed by the Crown Prosecution Service, so the charge changed from one trumped-up charge to another so the arresting officer, by hook or by crook, gets his conviction.

Just to put this in context, as well as attempting to expose the council tax liability order application process, namely the cosy and corrupt relationship that exists between local authorities and HMCTS, I have submitted evidence to Humberside police's economic crime unit relating to bailiff fee fraud, potentially amount to millions of pounds over a five year period. Again, I won't go into the fine detail here but the force has made it categorically clear that the evidence I have submitted does not warrant police resources being used and have pulled all sorts of stunts to avoid investigating, including wrongly classifying complaints in order to deny the complainant's appeal rights.

This would normally be the kind of matter that a potential recipient of a criminal record would rather keep under his hat, but when you think about it, it's a perfect opportunity to expose the justice system for what it is...'a complete and utter sham'. The authorities are keen to exploit the justice system to make money from contrived evidence but when it comes to serious crimes where the public is being scammed £millions by the state it turns a blind eye.

A date is set for an attendance at the Grimsby Magistrates court on 30 September 2015, the consequences of which I have been informed if I fail to do so may be a fine, imprisonment or both. I expressed my view that I have no confidence in the Grimsby Magistrates' court, it is a kangaroo court and have been lied to by the Justices Clerk in another matter (High Court appeal) and find it inappropriate that this court is given the opportunity to hear the case and pass judgment.

I feel however that I will be forced to appear (handcuffed if necessary) but will make it known to the bench that I consider a court which is complicit in the criminal actions of local authorities unlawfully claiming court costs is not fit to preside over my case.

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

The skeleton argument has been updated to reflect the judgment in the Haringey case (the link below). The document is unfinished, hence reference numbers to the Grounds of Appeal (GoA) edited out.

Draft Skeleton argument

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

I would love to be a fly on the wall at one of these: http://www.irrv.net/conferences/meeting.asp?Mid=1586



.

Wonder if the course content ran along these lines?

Court Costs and Update (IRRV 30 September 2015)

IRRV FORUM WEBINAR
–
30TH SEPTEMBER 2015



COURT COSTS: AN UPDATE


GARY L WATSON IRRV (HONS)

DEPUTY CHIEF EXECUTIVE IRRV

EDIT:

IRRVs view of some permissible/non-permissible costs

[Amethyst]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

Uploaded webinar slides.

[Adamna]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

Evidently they realise that they're in trouble, and it's not only about the future. The past is still with us. The "permissible/non-permissible costs" is a bit disingenuous.
"Some confusion in the case about documents that have to be issued by law but the gist is that only statutory reminder/final can be included and only for those who subsequently go to Summons stage"
I don't think anyone can be charged for those, or that there is any confusion, and will argue that they can't. There's no warning on the reminder notice that it could cost you £50. The idea that they could charge you £50 for an automated piece of paper is, of course, ridiculous. But that's the size of it.

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

Page 11 of the July 2015 presentation slides says it all:

Council Tax

When calculating the costs – no account should be taken of anything as follows:

–Post LO
–General administration of Council Tax
–no way now to include the full costs of the Recovery section

Page 13 of the same....

Council Tax
.....
No requirement for individual costs on a case by case basis

Could charge more for difficult cases......

The amount claimed by way of costs in any individual case must be no more than that reasonably incurred by the billing authority (para 51). Therefore, if the billing authority wanted to take advantage of streamlining the administration process by applying a standard sum in all cases (paras 47–51), in order for it to be done lawfully, it would need to forfeit each element of expenditure it incurs that is not common to every application (the majority of costs which council's account for).

In other words, a standard sum could not exceed that incurred by the authority in a case where the least expenditure is attributed – typical of a taxpayer settling his outstanding debt on receipt of a summons without contacting the council on any issue. Deriving a figure therefore from the ‘recoverable costs’ which is split between an estimated number of summons, can not be lawful; even less so if the number of summons is reduced to factor in an estimate for those withdrawn, waived and those in respect of unrecoverable costs. This is simply the only way to lessen the administrative burden of calculating the costs in each case, whilst at the same time complying with the regulations which require that the costs be no more than that incurred by the authority in any individual case.

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

Judicial Appointments & Conduct Ombudsman
102 Petty France
London
SW1H 9AJ

E headofoffice@jaco.gsi.gov.uk

www.judicialombudsman.gov.uk

PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL

By e-mail: [14 December 2015]

December 2015

JUDICIAL APPOINTMENTS AND CONDUCT OMBUDSMAN’S OFFICE

It has come to my notice that you have had neither a reply nor an acknowledgement to your e-mails of 8 and 19 August 2015 in connection with a matter that you had previously raised with the Advisory Committee for Yorkshire and South Humberside in September 2014.

I would like to apologise for this. This Office receives a large volume of correspondence and, although it should not happen, there is always a possibility that some might “slip through the net”. However, post should certainly not remain unanswered when people write alerting us to the fact that they have not received a response. I can only apologise for our shortcomings in this regard.

You are aware that the Judicial Appointments and Conduct Ombudsman’s remit enables him to consider concerns about the process by which complaints against Judicial Office Holders are dealt with under the arrangements for dealing with personal conduct matters. We describe this as a “second tier” investigation function. There are a number of organisations who might be responsible for conducting “first tier” investigations into Judicial Office Holders’ personal conduct. They include Advisory Committees, who are responsible for considering complaints about Magistrates in their area. Advisory Committees are required to consider whether there are issues in a Magistrate’s personal conduct that might warrant a disciplinary sanction and, if so, to refer the matter to the Judicial Conduct Investigations Office (JCIO).

The Ombudsman can consider whether the process followed by first tier bodies was in accordance with the set down procedures for dealing with judicial conduct matters (ie the Judicial Conduct (Magistrates) Rules 2014 and associated guidance) or whether there was any other aspect of maladministration. The Ombudsman cannot say whether the first tier body reached the correct decision. Nor can he comment on matters that are considered under arrangements other than those for dealing with judicial conduct matters and he cannot consider any issues thatrare before the Courts. I attach a copy of an Annex [see below] to the Ombudsman’s 2006/07 Annual Report, which includes a discussion of maladministration. You will see that it might encompass matters such as delay and inattention.

The Ombudsman does not normally accept complaints for investigation until the relevant “first tier” investigation has been concluded. There us one exception to this. In exceptional circumstances he will consider concerns about delay in investigating a first tier complaint before the first tier investigation has finished. Accepting a complaint about delay whilst an investigation is ongoing would not preclude the Ombudsman from conducting a further investigation after the first tier investigating body has concluded its deliberations.

The position as I understand it from the papers you have sent is that you submitted a complaint on 2 September 2014 to the Central Secretariat Office at Doncaster Magistrates’ Court. You said that you had concerns arising from a Council Tax Liability Order hearing in November 2012 and provided a chronology of events which you suggested was “evidence that the Magistrates’ conduct has been such to pervert the course of justice”. You provided a copy of correspondence that you had sent to the Judicial Office in May 2015 and to the JCIO in June 2015, both of whom said that they would alert the Justices’ Clerk to your concerns.

It appears from the documents you have sent that, as of August 2015, the Advisory Committee had not responded to any of your correspondence about the matter. If the case is still unresolved you may wish to ask the Ombudsman to consider the process by which the Advisory Committee has handled the matter to this point. If so I would be grateful if you could confirm and provide permission for this Office to disclose your complaint and correspondence to the Advisory Committee and for the Advisory Committee to provide this Office with copies of its documents.

You may be aware that information on the Ombudsman’s role and remit is contained on his website (https://www.gov.uk/government/organi...duct-ombudsman). This includes a form that people can fill in order to submit a complaint (I attach an electronic copy). However, if you are only asking the Ombudsman to consider concerns that the Advisory Committee had not responded to your concerns then you might believe that you have already set out your concerns about the process and that all you need to do would be to provide permission to disclose the complaint and file, as discussed above.

We look forward to hearing from you if you want the Ombudsman to consider issues regarding delay by Yorkshire and South Humberside Advisory Committee up to this point. If you wish to pursue a further complaint after the Advisory Committee’s deliberations are complete you would need to set out exactly why you believe that the Advisory Committee failed to follow a correct process and provide us with written permission to disclose, as discussed above (the best way of doing this might be to complete a complaint form). It would also be helpful if you could provide a copy of the Advisory Committee’s final response to your complaint. Please also be aware that the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 generally requires that people submit complaint to the Ombudsman within twenty eight days of being notified of the decision reached by the first tier body (there is scope to consider complaints received outside that timeframe if the Ombudsman considers it reasonable in all the circumstances).

I hope that this information is helpful. I apologise again for the very poor handling of your previous correspondence.


Acting Head of Office

ANNEX A

“Examples of maladministration by Sir William Reid” as quoted by the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman

In the 1993 Annual Report of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration, under the heading "What is maladministration?", Sir William Reid, the then Ombudsman, wrote:

"To define maladministration is to limit it. Such a limitation could work to the disadvantage of individual complainants with justified grievances which did not fit within a given definition. However I suggest an expanded list of examples going beyond those recounted in what has become known as the Crossman catalogue. When the Parliamentary Commissioner Bill was being taken through Parliament, the examples with Mr Crossman as Leader of the House of Commons then gave were bias, neglect, inattention, delay, incompetence, ineptitude*, perversity, turpitude, arbitrariness and so on. In the language of the 1990s I would add:

• rudeness (though that is a matter of degree);

• unwillingness to treat the complainant as a person with rights;

• refusal to answer reasonable questions;

• neglecting to inform a complainant on request of his or her rights or entitlement;

• knowingly giving advice which is misleading or inadequate;

• ignoring valid advice or overruling considerations which would produce an uncomfortable result for the overruler;

• offering no redress or manifestly disproportionate redress;

• showing bias whether because of colour, sex , or any other grounds;

• omission to notify those who thereby lose a right of appeal;

• refusal to inform adequately of the right of appeal;

• faulty procedures;

• failure by management to monitor compliance with adequate procedures;

• cavalier disregard of guidance which is intended to be followed in the interest of equitable treatment of those who use a service;

• partiality; and

• failure to mitigate the effects of rigid adherence to the letter of the law where that produces manifestly inequitable treatment."

*Crossman's list reads "inaptitude", not "ineptitude"

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

From: outlawlgo
To: Auditor (KPMG)
Sent: December 27, 2015
Subject: Audit Commission Act 1998 - Council tax summons costs Accounts

Dear Sir/Madam

Re: Declaration of unlawful account and report in the public interest

In your capacity as external auditor to North East Lincolnshire Council (the 'Council') I am requesting KPMG apply to the court for a declaration that an item of account is contrary to law under section 17(1) of the Audit Commission Act 1998 with respect to Council Tax court summons costs.

It would also seem appropriate that serious consideration is given whether to produce a report in the public interest under section 8 of the Audit Commission Act 1998.

Charge briefly outlined

A £60 sum is applied as standard to the taxpayer's account in all cases where the Council makes complaint to the Magistrates' court for alleged non-payment of council tax. The charge is added on serving a summons, whether or not the person summonsed is proceeded against in the Magistrates' court, or whether the Council incurs any expenditure in respect of resources expended engaging with the person.

Note: It is this activity (staff contact) for which a significant element of the £60 costs is attributed, see Annex F, attached Grounds of Appeal ("GoA").

Point of law

The Statutory Instrument which provides for claiming these costs is the Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1992. The level (and application) of costs are restricted to instituting the complaint (summons) by regulation 34(5) and where the case proceeds to court and a liability order is obtained, regulation 34(7) allows costs to include the additional expenditure attributed to that process.

The costs must be referable to each of these stages therefore a lesser sum is incurred by the Council for instituting the complaint and must not include any of the expenditure attributed to obtaining the court order, or other expenditure, like for example enforcing the order after it has been granted by the court.


The Council's policy to apply costs / Judicial review

As stated, the Council recharges a standard sum in all cases and therefore not in accordance with the incremental two stage approach outlined in the Regulations. Also, by applying the same sum in all cases, the situation arises where a taxpayer who simply settles his debt on receiving a demand (summons) subsidises the costs of another taxpayer who engages with staff, for example to renegotiate payment plans, and the subsequent expenditure attributed to monitoring the arrangement.

However, in a recent High Court case; R (Nicolson) v Tottenham Magistrates [2015] EWHC 1252 (Admin), the judge gave guidance in a bid to clarify the grey area surrounding the Council electing; i) to charge a standard sum in all cases; and ii) not to apply a lesser sum for instituting the complaint than the costs for proceeding to court and obtaining the liability order.

Paragraph 46 of the judgment (attached), with regard to a standard sum, states, so far as is relevant as follows:

46. In principle, therefore, provided that the right types of costs and expenses are taken into account, and provided that due consideration is given to the dangers of double-counting, or of artificial inflation of costs, it may be a legitimate approach for a local authority to calculate and aggregate the relevant costs it has incurred in the previous year, and divide that up by the previous (or anticipated) number of summonses over twelve months so as to provide an average figure which could be levied across the board in “standard” cases...

Paragraph 50 of the judgment, with regard to not applying a lesser sum for instituting the complaint etc., states as follows:

50. In principle there is no reason why a local authority should not decide to limit the costs it claims to the costs in connection with issuing the summons, although in practical terms that approach provides no incentive to the respondent to pay up after the summons is issued. What matters is that the costs that it does decide to claim are properly referable to the enforcement process.

Implications of R (Nicolson) v Tottenham Magistrates

The judge's opinion at para 46 is that it may be a legitimate approach to apply a standard sum in all cases. However, if wanting to take that approach (and do so lawfully) the standard sum would also have to be properly referable to the Regulations (regs 34 and 35). If there is any doubt as to what these regulations provide clarification has been provided in the Council Tax Practice Note 9: Recovery and Enforcement, produced by the Department of the Environment (1993) and more recently in the 2013 Government good practice guide, for the collection of Council Tax arrears, which both state that "the amount claimed by way of costs in any individual case is no more than that reasonably incurred by the authority".

In that case, given that the amount claimed by way of costs in any individual case must be no more than that reasonably incurred by the billing authority, if the Council wanted to take advantage of streamlining the administration process by applying a standard sum in all cases, in order for it to be done lawfully, it would need to forfeit each element of expenditure it incurs that is not common to every application (the majority of costs which are accounted for in its breakdown).

In other words, a standard sum could not exceed that incurred by the authority in a case where the least expenditure is attributed, which would in practice relate to a taxpayer settling his outstanding debt on receipt of a summons without contacting the council on any issue. Deriving a figure therefore from the ‘Gross Recoverable costs’ (see Annex F, GoA) which is split between an estimated number of summons, can not be lawful; even less so if the number of summons is reduced to factor in an estimate for those withdrawn, waived and those in respect of unrecoverable costs.

The least cost case is the only basis on which to determine a standard sum if the aim is to eliminate the administrative burden of calculating the costs in each case, whilst at the same time complying with the regulations which require that the costs be no more than that incurred by the authority in any individual case.

The Council sets its standard costs at a level to ensure that no cost of recovery is borne by the taxpayer in priority to complying with the Regulations that restrict the amount that can be recharged in costs to the court application (Annex C of GoA, particularly paras 4-10). It is therefore contended that an element of the standard £60 costs can not be compliant with the Regulations, based as they are on the premise that any expenditure considered attributable to recovery and enforcement activity (however tenuously linked) is recoverable by recharging it to the defendants through costs claimed in an application for a Liability Order

The breakdown of costs which the Council has undertaken to keep under review provides evidence that in the circumstances relating a taxpayer simply settling their debt on receiving a summons, the vast majority of expenditure it claims is not incurred for the issue of a summons so is contended that the claimed costs represent a sum outside that which the law provides.

If the Regulations were applied lawfully, the consequences would be that the majority of ‘Council Tax’ (£191,730), ‘Debt Recovery’ (£327,480) and the ‘Control & Monitoring’ costs (£109,380) would not be permissible in respect of re-charging expenditure for instituting the complaint (see paras 73-115, GoA).

Yours sincerely

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

Another case won in the High Court (council tax liability order costs).

Ewing v Highbury Corner Magistrates Court & Anor [2015] EWHC 3788

.........

11. The substantial question raised in lengthy written submissions and oral argument can be resolved without recourse, as the court was invited, to R v Willesden Justices ex parte Utley [1947] 1 KB 397 and other authorities on criminal sentencing. Regulation 34(7) of the Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1992 (SI 1992 No.613) provides that when granting a liability order the court shall make an order reflecting the aggregate of the outstanding council tax and a sum of an amount equal to the costs reasonably incurred by the applicant in obtaining the order.

12. Accordingly it is not necessary to form a view on the liability of the Claimant in the sum of £137.02. That is a matter which the Interested Party local authority must decide. The order made was the aggregate of the costs and the debt, the costs part of the order falls away, so must the balance which went to make up the aggregate. The liability order is also quashed.

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax Liability Order Applications Court Costs – Test Case

The following letter has been sent to Grimsby Magistrates' Court regarding North East Lincolnshire Council's court costs:

NELC Costs (letter) 14 January 2015

The spreadsheet referred to in the letter (Summons Cost Calculation 2014/15) is here; (see this link)


P.S. The Council's external auditor has commenced proceedings in the matter of applying to the court for a declaration that an item of account is contrary to law under section 17(1) of the Audit Commission Act 1998 with respect to Council Tax court summons costs and another matter.

Post #26 of this thread