A Tasmanian family has refused to pay council rates for seven years because they believe the land belongs to God.
The Beerepoot family own the Melita Honey Farm, a popular tourist stop in Chudleigh, northern Tasmania. In correspondence with the Meander Valley council they said they believed they had no ownership over the land and that to pay rates, and claim ownership by implication, would be bowing down to a “false god”.
The council was due to vote on Tuesday on whether to forcibly sell the land to recoup the unpaid rates, which come to $10,978, including interest.
“It would be disappointing in one respect to go down that path, but on the other hand they have to pay their rates,” Meander Valley mayor Craig Perkins said.
“If we said, ‘no, they don’t have to’, we would all convert to some deep Christian beliefs, or other deeply-held religious beliefs and claim that we didn’t have to pay it either.”
According to council briefing notes, the Beerepoots, who migrated from the Netherlands in the 1980s and moved to Tasmania in the 1990s, have been steadfastly refusing to pay rates since July 2010, despite a series of warnings from the council and one attempt by a councillor to use a textual analysis of scripture to convince them that paying rates did not undermine worship in God.
“Council’s world view is that the ‘law of the land’ governs life and thus also provides progress, growth and security,” a letter from the Beerepoots to the council argued in February.
“On the other hand, we believe that our heavenly father is sovereign and that he reigns today, thus we worship him and him alone so that his will is established on the Earth … you are asking us to bow down to a false god which is something we cannot do.”
The unpaid rates cover three properties: the honey farm shopfront in Chudleigh, a nearby house and a bed and breakfast at the nearby township of Mole Creek.
The council previously seized and sold a car owned by the family to recoup unpaid rates, but Perkins said continuing to seize smaller assets would not resolve the problem in the long term.
“The challenge with that process is that you can do it now to clear the debt that does exist, but you can’t clear forward rates … it becomes this ongoing process,” Perkins said.
He said it was not uncommon for the council to auction plots of vacant land to recoup unpaid rates, but this was a “very unusual” case.
“Unfortunately if we are to collect the unpaid rates on the three properties then we have to sell all three properties,” he said.
Fanny Beerepoot declined to talk to Guardian Australia.
“This is a conversation between us and our heavenly father and the council, and we are not commenting to the media,” she said.
