Unpaid council tax

A notice from a bailiff (Equita Bailiffs) came through our letter box today. It's for someone who hasn't lived here in a year. It was a very scary notice saying that a bailiff would be coming back and would enter the property even if no one's home to take personal property. Can they actually just break in like that? Don't they have to go to the court first for an order or does it work differently here? I was going to ignore it at first because I figured it wasn't our problem. But then I kinda freaked out because I don't think I'd like to come home one day to find stuff missing. 

Contact them.
Or contact the local council.

It sounds like they already have the court order. What exactly did the notice say? As genau said you're best to contact them and let them know that person does not live there any more.

We've had that happen with Equita as well - a phone call to them sorted it out, after which we phoned the council to let them know that that person no longer lived there. One thing to watch out for: Equita will very likely ask how you know about the situation given that the letter will have been addressed to the prior occupant and marked confidential. How you handle it is up to you, but I explicitly avoided stating that I had opened the letter even when they asked me 3 times, just telling them that I had 'been made aware' of the bailiff threat. I've no idea what the implications or consequences are of having done this, but I didn't want to find out.

First phone call is to the council.
Second phone call is to the bailiffs.

They cannot break in. You have to allow them entry. Bailiffs firms are reknown for dodgy tactics so you just need to know the law which is:

You are not liable. Get a letter from the council stating that.
They cannot force entry.
You do not HAVE to let them in, no matter what they say, and they WILL lie.
If you DO let them in, they can and will take whatever they want.
If they turn up, just tell them, through the closed door, that you are not the "respondent" and are not liable and they should leave.
If the continue to harrass, call the police.

Sorry to be a bit of a drama queen about this, but a friend went through exactly the same thing and we had to call the cops to get them to leave her alone until the company sorted it out.

I never opened any envelope. It wasn't even in an envelope. It was just a piece of paper shoved through the letter box. Not sealed or anything. Not marked 'confidential.' We thought it was just a piece of junk mail or another pizza place menu. We just gave the paper to our landlord and he said he'd give them a call.

Please don't leave this to your landlord. Ring the council!

Please don't leave this to your landlord. Ring the council!

Absolutely, your landlord isn't your point of contact for the council, and doesn't have anything to lose if it isn't sorted out. This is something that you have to sort out for yourself if you want to be sure that it's done properly.

We had a letter like that from the water board when we moved in.  Baliffs, etc etc entering house blah blah.

All we had to do was fax them a copy of our lease.  I wouldn't leave it up to anyone other than me.

I agree, this is a DIY job. It shouldn't be too much problem, give the council your council tax reference number and it should become obvious to them the other person is no longer there.