Emotional Martin Lewis welcomes changes to 'aggressive' council tax practiceSource: Martin Lewis
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00:00I'm a bit teary, if I'm honest, in a good way, though, because I just had a win that I wasn't expecting.
00:05It's almost sort of feels slightly anticlimactic, but it's amazing.
00:09So I've just got off air, literally just off air after presenting Good Morning Britain.
00:13And this is all about council tax debt collection, which is something along with my charity, the Money and Mental Health Policy Institute,
00:20which I've been campaigning on since last November, because it is the most vicious and aggressive and damaging form of debt collection that is out there.
00:31If you miss a monthly payment within three weeks, they will last you for a year's payment, most councils.
00:36Then if you don't pay that and how are you going to pay for a year if you can't afford to pay for the month?
00:40Two weeks later, they'll go to court and they'll get a liability order, which will normally add 150 quid onto your costs.
00:47And a week later, they can have bailiffs in six weeks from missing one payment to bailiffs in for the entire year, plus additional costs.
00:55It is absolutely catastrophic and devastating for people's finances.
00:58No commercial company would be allowed to do the same because they have a consumer duty.
01:02That means they have a duty to, first of all, do what's in the best interest of consumers.
01:07And it would take probably six months to a year before they got in the same situation.
01:12And council tax have constituents who don't have those rights.
01:16So this has been something I have met since we've been campaigning on it.
01:20And it was something that originally came from the research community of my charity with all these people who've got mental health and money problems saying this is a bad one.
01:26So many people for whom council tax debt collection has been absolutely catastrophic and the tipping point that has destroyed their finances because of the aggressive and rapid progression of how much debts they come in.
01:40And we've been fighting it. And the main thing is to say, look, don't suddenly ask people for a year, three weeks after they can't pay a month.
01:47Try and signpost them for debt help and work with them so they can afford to pay.
01:50And we had the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, which is a senior member of the Cabinet, Pat McFadden, on the show.
01:57And I notified yesterday that I wanted to talk about this because what often happens when you've got politicians on it and if it's not their department say, sorry, I can't talk.
02:05I don't know. So I don't want you to be able to say I don't know about this.
02:08And I've had meetings with senior people in the government on this before.
02:13And then at eight o'clock, we got a statement, a right of reply.
02:16And I was expecting the usual, oh, we'll try and do everything.
02:18And at the end, it said we will be launching a consultation.
02:22And it was just I was like, what? I mean, first, we're launching a consultation.
02:25And then we had Pat McFadden on the show. And he said, yeah, me said, we're consulting.
02:30I said, are you consulting? He said, well, we'll launch a consultation this week.
02:33I mean, that is. And what he then said is because we absolutely we will look at this issue that we should not be suddenly allowing them to ask for a year's worth of payments when they've just missed the month.
02:44Because how's that? How are people who can't pay a month going to be able to pay for a year?
02:48Sorry if I'm not being as lucid as I normally am.
02:51And I just I'm suddenly sitting there afterwards going, yes, I cannot tell you how many desperate people I have met.
03:03Whose lives have been absolutely ruined by this form of debt collection.
03:08We're hearing someone on the show who had bailiffs to their hospital bed.
03:13And well, look, I mean, it's only a consultation, but I'm hoping that this is the start of changing things.
03:19This has it's one of those things that people don't talk about, but affects millions of people.
03:23And suddenly it's a campaign win out of nowhere.
03:26I'm very happy, slightly confused, trying to work out what work I need to do and a little bit emotional about it.
03:31So I thought I'd just record that feeling and try and explain it to you.