Discount on Non-British spouse council tax?

Has anyone come across this?  I have lived here for 4 1/2 years and we have always paid council tax on the basis of two adults living in a dwelling.  Well, we finally bought a place in November and when we notified the council they sent us our new bill with our new band listed but they also enclosed a booklet with it. One of the things the booklet does is have a list of people who do not count towards the number of adults residents in a dwelling. One of them is Non-British spouses OR dependents of students.  We didn't know anything about this. Has anyone come across this before? I wonder if we could be entitled to a refund?  Of course now that I have naturalized it wouldn't count.

I did a quick Google search and it seems that there is a discount for non-British spouses of students who dont have the right to work in the UK.

From a random local authority site off the interweb:

"Non British Spouses of Students

This category is for the spouse or dependant of a student who is not a British citizen and is prevented by immigration regulations from taking paid employment, or claiming benefits whilst in the UK. (Please put your request in writing and provide the relevant documentation)."

Our booklet says OR and not OF. I wonder if they made a misprint in the booklet?

"Non-British spouses or dependants of students" can mean non-British spouses of students or non-British dependants of students.

It's how you read the phrase.

The word "or" to me, signifies another option not necessarily pertaining to the option before and/or after it. Because in the list it gives they have 12 options. The start of the paragraph reads "people in the following groups do not count twards members of adults resident in a dwelling:


"Full time students, students nurses, apprentices and Youth trainees or
patients, residents in hospital or care homes or
people staying in certain hostels or night shelters or........
.....non-British spouses or dependents of students or....."

The spouses part says nothing pertaining to being a student. Those are two sperate ideas. I think if it meant non-british spouse of a student or dependants of non-british spouses it would have said so like that. I know there may be some other council sites that list theirs differently but I am just going by what our council has put out.

I know I am getting all technical on sentance structure. But it can mean something entirely different. I think I am going to have DH ring up today and found out. Oh, wouldn't it be wonderful if it was the case?

sidenote:  Sentance structure has always one of my pet peeves. (for the same reason I hate Tesco's saying "Every little helps". I just want to scream every little WHAT helps?! Where's the noun in that sentance? lol)

You're entering the realm of logic which sometimes trips up programmers who aren't aware of the default order of operator precedence in a language! 

In other words, "Non-British spouses OR dependents of students" could be read as:

1.  (Non-British spouses OR dependents) of students

 - or -

2.  (Non-British spouses) OR (dependents of students).

I'm not certain, but I suspect the former was probably the intended meaning.

yeah, I had a sneaking suspicion but I was really trying on this one!  lol 

I used to work in Council Tax (I know but a job is a job!) and I can tell you that this one is intended for foreign students with dependant spouses or adult children. The spouse or child must be here because they are being supported by the student and be unable to seek work. Their visa must support this.

It's basically for those mature students who would lose their exemption due to having their families with them.