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Council tax set for inspection By Sarah Pennells
Would you like a council tax official poking around your home, checking to see whether you've added a new bathroom or have converted your loft into a bedroom? No, probably not. But for months there has been speculation that an army of 'council At the moment, council tax is based on 1991 property values - not exactly up-to-date figures. The Government had planned a revaluation of properties in England, but postponed them over two years ago and says the revaluation will not happen during the lifetime of this parliament. So why all the fuss? Well, possibly because the Valuation Office Agency (VOA), which decides the band in which a property belongs, currently holds photographs of over 700,000 properties. Perhaps it is because the VOA is paying the property website Rightmove.com for information on houses that have been bought and sold. Or perhaps it's because the VOA owns almost 2,500 digital cameras. According to the VOA, the critics - and the media - are making a fuss out of nothing. Indeed, its website carries a section devoted to "setting the record straight" and here it said that the agency has always had the right to enter someone's home. It also says that no-one has ever been fined or prosecuted because they've not allowed a council tax inspector into their home and - despite the fact that its inspectors have been issued with a new handbook - they've been given no new powers. A revenue raising exercise? The new guidelines do, however, propose that even small property features, such as cupboards and attics, are taken into consideration. Oh, and there are no plans for a council tax banding revaluation. But many homeowners are really afraid that whenever it does happen, it will be a revenue raising exercise. Certainly, if you look at what has happened in Wales, where there was a revaluation in 2005, the signs are not promising. There, one-in-three homes moved up at least one band and only 8% moved down. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors said that the revaluation in England must be "revenue neutral". So that the only properties that would move up a band are those that have risen in value either because they've been extended or done up (now perhaps there's something that TV property makeover shows should warn viewers about) or because the area they're in has seen higher price rises than the national average. After all, the Government-commissioned review, published this year, said the Government must act to improve trust in the council tax. Maybe we'll have nothing to worry about. Maybe turning council tax inspectors into property paparazzi is just a benign updating of their working methods. But after a promise that the revaluation exercise in Wales would not raise council tax was followed by a 6% increase in revenue, we cannot be sure.
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