To ask the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills how many individual bankruptcy petitions in which council tax arrears were mentioned as a significant reason were received by the Official Receiver in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement. (302123)

According to our database, the number of individual bankruptcy orders which are recorded as being made upon the petition of a local authority for each of the last five years ending 31 March were:

In the majority of bankruptcy cases where a creditor presents a petition, often referred to as a creditor’s petition bankruptcy, the petitioner is a single creditor. This creditor may not be the majority creditor. A local authority may also be a creditor in a creditor's petition bankruptcy case where it is not the petitioning creditor.

The number of cases cited above does not include cases where an individual presented their own bankruptcy petition, often referred to as a debtor’s petition bankruptcy, where the local authority may have been one of their creditors. Such information is not readily available, but in any event it is unlikely in such cases that a debt to a local authority will have been a significant factor as compared with debts owed to other creditors.

I will not be making a statement on this.