Quite why no one bothered to suggest that this tax - SocietyGuardian.co.uk | Society | Q&A: the future of the council tax - was just as rubbish as the rates system and only marginally better than the Poll Tax at the time it was introduced is beyond me. It's quite clear that any tax that costs so much should be related to income and not house value. Come on, how many piss poor people do you know who have a a property of some pretty good worth? I know quite a few, mainly retired, people.

Incidentally, Council Tax only makes up 5% of the taxes we pay individually. Surprising, isn't it. And we're one of the lightest taxed countries in Europe!

I certainly hope we can get this sorted as soon as possible and do the decent thing and get an income-related tax system worked out. The point of taxes is that those with can help those without and provide some ground level services that must be guaranteed to everyone (like rubbish collection), not just to syphen off as much as possible from everyone, whether they can afford it or not.