Durham County Council have pledged to find a way to force Government Adviser Dominic Cummings to pay his Council Tax bill.
Councillor Simon Henig is responding to the uproar from the public after Cummings’ tax affairs were revealed.
Henig said: “It seems that anyone working for the Prime Minister is exempt from the rules that apply to the rest of us.”
Mr Cummings became a national figure when he decided to ignore lockdown guidance in March.
Instead he drove from London to County Durham with his wife and son when they began to suffer with symptoms of Covid.
Cummings then drove Barnard Castle, around 30 miles away, on his wife’s birthday to test his eye sight.
Lockdown cottage
The Northern Echo reports that “two properties, including the Mr Cummings’ notorious ‘lockdown cottage’, at the family farm near Durham, were built in breach of planning regulations and are now liable for council tax”.
It had emerged that council tax on two properties Cummings owns would not be backdated to when the dwellings were built. This would in effect hand the Cummings the equivalent to a “30k tax break”.
Cllr Henig said: “As a party that is committed to fairness, as soon as we were aware of a potential breach in regulations at North Lodge, council officers were instructed to investigate the matter.
“In turn, Durham County Council alerted the Valuation Office Agency, which provided details of the required changes in respect to property.
Imperative
“However, while there have been historical breaches of planning and building control regulation, which date back to the time of the former Durham City Council, the current council was unable to take enforcement action due to the amount of time that had elapsed.
“People will want to know how, once again, the Government’s senior adviser is avoiding facing any consequences for breaching a set of regulations to which everyone else is expected to adhere.”
“Furthermore, it is imperative that the Valuation Office Agency be made accountable for this decision in Parliament so that public confidence in the council tax system be maintained.”
Related: Daily Star provides free ‘council tax avoidance’ kit with Cummings cut-out
