Sir.-Council tax has more than doubled over the last 10 years, and is rising at more than three times the rate of inflation.

It has outstripped any rise in the income of most pensioners and the lower paid.

Many older people are being forced to use their retirement savings to pay the relentless inflation-busting council tax that is inflicted upon them, and these same savings make them ineligible for the means-tested council tax benefit.

To illustrate the unfairness of this tax, my wife and I are pensioners in our 70s with a modest occupational pensio, living in a band G property, for which we have to pay the council £1,850 per annum.

On the other hand, we have a Prime Minister and his wife, who have just paid £3,600,000 for a band H property in Connaught Square, W1. They are believed to have an income in excess of £300,000 per annum and they are rewarded by the ultra-efficient Westminster City Council with a council tax of £1,600!

A recent correspondent, R S Gates, equated council tax with parking and private refuse charges. However, with parking and refuse charges, I have a choice. I can either pay them, or refuse to pay and do without.

With council tax there is no choice - you either pay up in full or they send in the bailiffs.

Council tax is unjust. It cannot be modified or tinkered with; it has to be completely abolished and replaced by a tax related to people's income.

On Monday, a leading anti-council tax campaigner will present his case to the European Parliament in Brussels.

For further information, go to www.isitfair.co.uk

-Brian L Sperring, Maynards Wood, Chineham.