SWINDON Borough Council’s use of bailiffs has come under fire from a debt charity after freedom of information requests revealed there had been a 21.5 per cent increase of the use of bailiffs to tackle council tax and business arrears in a two year period.

In the last financial year the borough council made 11,994 bailiff referrals the Money Advice Trust has revealed through a freedom of information request.

Of these referrals 8,003 were in relation to council tax arrears, 3,771 were for parking and 220 were for business rates.

This ranked Swindon Borough Council in 51st place out of 326 local authorities in England and Wales for bailiff use.

An FOI seen by the Swindon Advertiser from Swindon Borough Council obtained by the Money Advice Trust in 2013 shows that in 2012 there were 6,237 referrals for council tax arrears and 215 for business rates.

The charity claimed that this showed there had been an 86 per cent increase in two years, but the earlier figures did not include any statistics for parking referrals.

Swindon Borough Council has disputed the increase, but was unable to provide correct figures for 2012 before the Swindon Advertiser went to press.

Commenting on the 86 per cent increase a spokesman for the borough council said: “The figures the charity have given for Swindon are seriously inaccurate, and we completely reject them. We have no idea how they have arrived at the conclusion that there has been such a huge increase in the use of bailiffs in Swindon

“The increases in the timeframe they have given have been modest and not exceptional compared to other councils. Our council tax collection rates are among the best in the country. The charity themselves say that councils that use bailiffs to excess don’t achieve our level of collection performance. They need to look at their figures again.”

A Money Advice Trust spokesperson said: “The figures on council bailiff use in our research have been taken from councils’ own responses to our Freedom of Information requests this year and two years ago, and are correct based on the information we were provided by local authorities themselves.”

What the figures do show is that there has been an increase of 21.5 per cent on the number of referrals for bailiffs to deal with council tax matters and business rates.

Joanna Elson OBE, chief executive of the Money Advice Trust, the charity that runs National Debtline, said that the council’s use of bailiffs remained too high.

She said: “Local councils are facing significant funding pressures – and they of course have a duty to collect what they are owed. In the case of council tax this is crucial in ensuring proper funding for the services that local people rely on.

“The council’s use of bailiffs, however, remains too high. On the front line of debt advice we know that sending the bailiffs in can deepen debt problems, rather than solve them – and it can also have a severe impact on the wellbeing of people who are often already in a vulnerable situation.

“Bailiff action is not only harmful to those in arrears – it is also a poor deal for the council taxpayer.

"Our research shows that the councils who use bailiffs the most are actually less effective at collecting council tax arrears. That’s why we are urging councillors to consider ways they can improve the council’s debt collection practices, and ensure that bailiffs are only used as an absolute last resort.

“I would urge anyone in Swindon who is struggling to cope with council tax arrears, or any other type of debt, to seek free advice from National Debtline as soon as possible.”