As a former local government chief executive, I know that fair and effective revenue recovery is an essential part of addressing gaps in local authority finances and delivering properly funded services.
Since March 2020, according to The Guardian, more than 4.5 million payments to lenders have been deferred.
Those deferrals are now ending and central government funds for tax relief are running out, so local councils are stepping up efforts to recover around £5 billion in outstanding payments, including for council tax, parking fines and child support.
Local authorities in England referred around 280,000 households to bailiffs over council tax debt in the first year of the pandemic, and these numbers are anticipated to rise as the cost-of-living crisis intensifies.
During my time as Chief Executive of Merton Council, we received frequent complaints about inappropriate, intimidating behaviour from certain enforcement agents, and that lack of clarity around enforcement fees caused considerable distress.
This was proving harmful to those experiencing enforcement and damaging to the council’s reputation, so we created an in-house enforcement team, allowing us to control the process.
We were able to be more sensitive to vulnerable debtors and ensure that ethical enforcement standards were maintained. The mandatory use of body-worn cameras made a significant difference too.
This direct experience of the complexities of debt collection and its connection to delivering effective local government services inspired me to join the new Enforcement Conduct Board (ECB) as a non-executive board member.
The ECB was created as part of a joint initiative by debt advice charities and the enforcement industry to ensure that everyone experiencing enforcement action in England and Wales is treated fairly.
We are working on several early priorities, including reviewing the current process for complaints.
This will involve collecting data from the enforcement industry and the debt advice sector to inform a transparent evidence base, enabling better understanding of the reality of the current situation.
We are also seeking to establish the widest possible coverage so that no enforcement agency, whether privately owned or in-house, can avoid the rules. This will require the direct support of local authorities as significant creditors and commissioners of enforcement services.
Specifically, we are calling on local authorities to commit to only working with enforcement agents who are signed up to ECB oversight and contributing appropriately to the funding of the board.
Given the benefits that would accrue to creditors from improved standards in the enforcement sector, the ECB also intends to approach utility companies and local authorities (among others) to explore whether they could contribute to the oversight costs of the businesses that they rely on for enforcement services.
Pressures on the public purse and the increasing demands on local authorities mean that effective debt recovery is more critical than ever, and the cost-of-living crisis means that the number and vulnerability of people experiencing debt enforcement is likely to rise sharply over the coming months.
Balancing effective debt collection with the protection of the most vulnerable is a challenging task.
That’s why it’s so important that the ECB has now been established, and that all interested parties – including those in local government – work with us to assure fair treatment for everyone experiencing enforcement action.
We look forward to working with elected councillors and local government officers to turn this ambition into reality.