According to the Audit Commission, the model investigation letter provided online for councils carrying out their fishing trips in search of fraud was provided by Hillingdon. Hillingdon has as yet to confirm or deny this.
Perhaps the Borough has now corrected the original so that the commas and possessive apostrophes are in the first place, but the Commission has not.
More importantly, this letter, begins with a legally inaccurate statement.
It opens as follows (incorrect comma as per the original)
My records show that you receive a discount on your council tax bill, as you are the sole occupier at the above-mentioned address.
The records of the General Manager of the Council Tax Office can, of course, show no such thing.
For the council has issued a bill based on the statutory assumption that there will be entitlement to the same rate of discount for the whole of the coming year.
Moreover, the recipient will know that the General Manager is talking through the wrong orifice because when the council sent the demand notice, it complied with the law and informed him of the above-mentioned statutory assumption and of his legal duty under Regulation 16 to correct it should it turn out to be wrong.
Unless, of course, the recipient lives in Hillingdon. For there is no evidence as yet that Hillingdon does comply with the clear requirements of the legislation that tells it what information it must provide with the demand notice.
On the other hand, there is evidence that somebody at Hillingdon is making up laws, and making up situations in which the council tax department can levy a penalty. For its Council Tax leaflet for 2010/11, on page 18
If you have been allowed a discount or exemption
and something changes in your household which means that
you may longer be entitled to a reduction, you have a duty to
notify the council within 21 days of the change.
Later on, the same leaflet includes the following information:
Change of circumstances
If your bill shows a discount or an exemption, you must tell
us immediately of any change in circumstances which may
affect your entitlement to either.
Changes include people leaving or joining your household,
children reaching the age of 18 even if they are still at school,
college or university, a person no longer being in one of the
discount groups, for example a student finishing their course
of study, or the property becoming occupied.
Failure to tell us within 21 days of a change without good
reason, may mean that you are liable for a £70.00 penalty.
This can be increased to £280.00 for repeated failures.
If you are receiving sole occupancy discount it is essential that
you let us know if your circumstances change and you are no
longer entitled to it.
The phrase 'sole occupancy discount' leaps out at one, since of course there is no such thing, but the Audit Commission appears to have instructed a barrister in late 2007 on the basis that there was, and on the basis that an auditor could tell by looking at the electoral register that there was probably lack of entitlement. Indeed, that is more or less the story which the NFI team's internal minutes tell.
Whatever, the true story, it is clear that the model letter allegedly supplied to the Commission by Hillingdon misrepresents the legal situation and strongly suggests that somebody in Hillingdon is misinterpreting personal data in a significantly incorrect manner.
On the face of it, then, it would appear that the Audit Commission is taking advice from a council which cannot even provide to its customers clear, fair and accurate information as required under its general duty of care and when a law is quite clear and specific about what it must tell them.
This opens up the interesting possibility that the rest of the incorrect material that the Audit Commission has published since 2006 on this matter also originates with Hillingdon.
And indeed the early Audit Guides produced by the Audit Commission actually thank Hillingdon for showing them the way.
But of course the Audit Commission really ought to have checked their fact first.