COUNCIL tax would be scrapped or made fairer if 100 pensioners volunteered to go to jail for non-payment, a Mersey MP said yesterday.
Frank Field, Labour MP for Birkenhead, told a committee of MPs that a mass campaign by over-65s willing to be locked up would force the Government to act.
Two pensioners have hit the headlines in recent years after going to prison for refusing to pay their council tax, one a retired vicar.
But Mr Field said: "They should ensure that the 100 pensioners refusing to pay and willing to be put in prison are not members of any political party.
"The public would not put up with a large number of pensioners being put in prison simply because they think the council tax is unfair."
Mr Field added: "If that view has occurred to me, then I'm sure it has also occurred to the leaders of the campaign."
The Birkenhead MP made his comments in evidence to the work and pensions committee inquiry into pension reform, after straying into the impact of council tax on the elderly.
Inflation-busting increases year-on-year have provoked protests from pensioners, who complain they are hit the hardest because they are on fixed incomes.
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