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Council Tax (New Valuation Lists for England) Bill

My right hon. Friend makes a good point but unfortunately I have no figures to illustrate it. All I can do is to illustrate the costs of a national scheme with its inherent inflexibility. As I understand it, despite the fact that that role has been withdrawn from the VOA, the Minister said in Committee that 600 staff would leave the agency between 30 March and 30 June 2006. What are those 1,200 staff doing in the meantime? Why were they not made redundant immediately, given that the function that they performed was removed? The Minister may feel for the families and the employees—