The Sunday Telegraph reveals that as many as 400,000 householders may have been paying too much council tax because of incorrect banding and, although ministers knew, they did nothing about it.
Eric Pickles MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, told the newspaper: "It is scandalous that the Government has found out that many homes could be wrongly banded, but has refused to correct these errors to avoid paying refunds and incurring bad coverage."