A COUPLE who had to move away as their baby son receives treatment for a life-threatening condition have expressed their dismay at St Helens Council’s refusal to exempt them from council tax.

Dawn and Steven McCauley's new-born son, Lorcan was diagnosed with Severe Combined Immune Deficiency in September, after spending the first eight weeks of his life in and out of Whiston Hospital.

Lorcan’s only chance of survival was to have a bone marrow transplant at the Great North Children Hospital, in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, meaning his parents had to leave their lives in St Helens behind for six months.

Lorcan underwent the transplant on Tuesday, October 28 and has been confined to a sterile room in the hospital to avoid infection.

However, Dawn, 39 and Steven, 49 learned they would still have to pay council tax on their Knowsley Road property.

“We’ve detached ourselves from St Helens, within 24 hours we were up in Newcastle,” said Dawn, who had to leave her job in administration behind.

“We contacted the council to inform them and that in accordance with the exempt properties on the back of the bill our property would be free from council tax.

“However, we were told as our son was in hospital we did not need to be there with him but our social worker confirmed that if we were not here with him, we could be prosecuted for child neglect. I need to be here with my son."

In response, St Helens Council said: “We did look at the case but the Class J exemption (the property is unoccupied because the usual occupier has gone to live elsewhere to provide care) does not apply as they are not providing care for their son, the hospital is.

“The council had advised the family of this. However to ease their burden we have extended their payments to March 2014 reducing their monthly payments by half. However it could be that they could qualify for the local Council Tax Reduction scheme and we would be happy to look into that for them.”