Ten Things That Remind Me Of Purgatory (I)

It is not often that I break life up into easily digestible bullet points, but for this article I will make an exception. There are certain experiences in life that seem specially designed to turn even the sanest individual into a brainless android. Most of these seem to involve the government, or rather the behemoth called public sector bureaucracy, but at least a chosen few are delivered by the bloated incompetence of private sector ‘solutions’.

1) Council offices

'No. I'm a tax-paying pillar of the community.' This is how I always respond, in my mind at least, when someone asks if I'm still a student. Although youthful good looks may get you many things, they do become tedious when people assume you spend your days gaining knowledge, rather than hemorrhaging it which seems to be the natural adult condition.

However, the reason why I never quite manage to articulate such a phrase, apart from the fact that I am not naturally verbose, is that I would be lying. This in itself does not bother me. Lying to strangers has never ranked very highly on my moral radar.

However, lying about tax, no matter how tangentially, is something that most people think twice about. Tax officials have gained a reputation for near omniscience, even if this is largely the result of American courthouse movies; in Britain, I suspect the truth is closer to the 'middle-aged fat man with a bald patch' scenario that has amused us so harmlessly for decades.

However, to really understand the way that private money metamorphoses into public good, you have to go to your local council offices. These are the kind of places where you sort out your parking permit, protest at parking fines and hand over large amounts of money for council tax because your payment card has not been delivered and the council, functioning at a stately pace, has not yet sent you another.

To truly appreciate the experience of council offices you must go to those in Edinburgh on the Royal Mile at festival time. This way you will be accosted by pushy Americans/Oxbridge types trying to hand you out flyers which insist, usually fraudulently, that their theatre production is very good.

Smiling tightly and suggesting that you are a) working and b) trying to pay your council tax, an experience as enjoyable as having your teeth removed, will only gain you the momentary pleasure of perplexing a thespian; to be fair, you probably only need to mention a) to achieve this.

Councils, quite wisely, manage the public herd by issuing numbers. This means that they can be fair, equitable, committed to diversity (etc) and you can have the doubtful pleasure of knowing exactly how slowly the queue is moving.

Or perhaps you stand in a line, a more old fashioned way of managing affairs and one for which certain English people are temperamentally suited.

In any case, you, and a large number of other people who do not want to be there, get to wait for a long time to hand over money that you would much rather keep. This in itself, is brilliant – society at its most successful.

The other side of the coin is that you get to see people collecting money they would much rather have. This sector of the populace is usually called the less fortunate and indeed they are unfortunate if they have to spend most of their lives filling in long and boring forms which probe into every aspect of their lives.

If your taste is for perversion, then you can go to any council tax office safe in the knowledge that whatever ill may have been done to you by the council – then you are in the wrong. There is usually small print to prove it.

One such example is the joint and several liability council tax clause. I mentioned this at a dinner party once when asked why I had made an appointment with my local MSP. Then there was silence. This clause is not something people really know about unless they fall victim to its peculiar logic, which many do. In short, everyone in a shared flat is equally liable for the whole sum of council tax – there is no such concept as paying 'your fair share'. Thus if your (ex) flatmate decides not to pay and leaves for Belize, or even for just around the corner, you, and any other honest flatmates, will be legally responsible for the outstanding sum. Brilliant.

Or perhaps you wish to complain because the gas company were digging up your street and you were forced to double-park after work (rather than say, park in Livingstone) and were fined as a result. ‘But I pay £180 pounds to park nearby,’ you may bleat, but alas, your case is hopeless.

It's not that council employees are a bad lot, for often they are very pleasant. It is rather that the aggregate system has the creative sense of a warthog and the moral sense of a turnip.

It also seems to insist, quite atrociously, on playing up-beat music that can only lead to thoughts of suicide.

The main reason in my mind, though, why council tax offices are purgatorial is that they turn everyone into a 'little man.' Everyone, even those collecting money, look anxious and depressed. Life is hard and quite possibly Calvinist. We are made to suffer – although on a good day you need only contemplate your own meaningless.

Heads bow, hands twitch and clothes take on a dull shade of grey.

'Welcome to purgatory,' the official who meets you should say. 'Now how much can I do you for?'

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Ten Things That Remind Me Of Purgatory (I)