Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott has been forced to apologise for failing to pay council tax on his official residence for eight years. In a statement Prescott said it was a “genuine misunderstanding.” He apologised to the House of Commons and reimbursed the relevant government departments. The deputy prime minister pays full council tax on his family home in Hull and used to pay it on the trade union flat he occupied in Clapham, south London. Prescott owed £3,830 on the ministerial flat in Admiralty House, near Trafalgar Square. In the statement Prescott added: “I am now aware that an inadvertent error has occurred. I have therefore issued this answer to a parliamentary question to correct the record and to fully apologise to the House." All media