Abolish Council Tax Bands, Argues Think Tank

Council tax bands should be abolished, giving local authorities the freedom to set their own flat rate levy, according to a report from a think tank. In Moving beyond Mansion Tax, CentreForum argues councils should be allowed to retain any revenue raised from homes valued at £2m or below to pay for local services. Any tax raised from homes worth more than £2m, would be distributed nationally under the plans. It argues this new system would make property tax fairer than the proposed Mansion Tax and would strengthen the links between taxpayers and local services. Read more on the LocalGov website.

Mansion Tax: Most Tory Supporters Prefer Labour's Housing Policy

With the UK housing market facing its biggest crisis of the last 100 years, it's no surprise that housing has soared as one of the topics voters are most concerned about. With an election looming, the Conservative Party should take notice when its own supporters side with the Opposition when it comes to these two critical issues.

1.       Tory supporters WANT a mansion tax – 49% of Tories support the Mansion Tax

2.       Tory supporters are in favour of rent capping – 60% of Tories are in favour of Rent Capping

Read more on the Daily Mirror website.

Mansion Tax: Charging Foreign Buyers and Empty Houses More Would Raise Same Cash

Labour could generate the same amount of money by ditching the mansion tax and instead raising levies on empty houses, foreign buyers and buy-to-let landlords, a new report has found. Analysis by the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) found targeted taxation could raise more than £6 billion next parliament without hitting cash-strapped families. The findings call into question whether Labour’s plans to make people in houses worth more than £2 million pay more is the fairest way to boost revenues through property tax. Read more on the Daily Telegraph website.

Changing Council Tax Bands 'Could Raise £3.5bn More Than Mansion Tax'

Labour faces embarrassment over its mansion tax plans after an independent report found council tax reform would be ‘fairer’ and raise four times as much. Ed Miliband claims his flagship policy will raise £1.2billion a year on homes worth more than £2million. But the Centre for Economic and Business Research says it is ‘improbable’ that they would raise so much. Instead, it claimed that tweaking council tax bands, which have not changed for 25 years, would be a more ‘progressive’ way to raise revenue. Adding three extra brackets for high-end properties would generate an extra £4.7billion a year, it said. Read more on the Daily Mail website.

Ukip Announce Mansion Tax Break for Historic Home Owners

While Labour demand a mansion tax, Ukip have unveiled a mansion tax-break. The UK Independence Party has pledged to cut the tax bills of the owners of listed buildings, in a move that could benefit the party’s biggest donors. Nigel Farage’s party has promised to exempt historic buildings from VAT at 20 per cent on their building work, in a move that could save wealthy owners of historic mansions and castles hundreds of thousands of pounds. It would be replaced with a rate of 5 per cent. Read more on the Daily Telegraph website.

Mansion Tax 'Would Hit 86,000 Properties in Capital'

A total of 86,000 London homeowners will be hit by the mansion tax, according to a new estimate of the number of properties worth at least £2 million. The analysis suggests the levy would be paid by just under 110,000 households across the UK — of which almost 80 per cent are in London.  The research, by Zoopla, shows £2 million homes are found in every London borough except Barking & Dagenham. They are most heavily concentrated in Kensington & Chelsea, where there are reported to be 22,454, and Westminster, hosting 18,596. But the surge in house prices in the first half of the year means an increasing number in the suburbs could affected by the proposed levy. Read more on the Evening Standard website.

Mansion Tax Threat Is Putting Buyers off £2m-Plus Homes

The threat of a mansion tax after next May’s general election has put off potential buyers of £2m-plus homes in London, Savills has said. The uncertainty surrounding the 7 May vote will continue to hold back the very top end of the capital’s luxury property market in the next few months, the upmarket estate agent added. Would-be buyers are sitting on their hands because Labour has pledged to introduce a new levy on owners of homes worth more than £2m to raise £1.2bn for the NHS if it wins the election.  Read more on the Guardian website.

Mansion Tax 'Will Punish the Prudent'

Families who have saved hard to own their own home would be punished under Labour’s ‘mansion tax’ plans, a major insurer has warned. Chief executive of Legal and General, Nigel Wilson, said the party was ‘pandering to the politics of envy’. He fears that Ed Miliband's pledge to impose a tax on homes worth more than £2 million would exacerbate the housing shortage and make it hard for first-time buyers to get a foot on the property ladder. Mr Wilson said: ‘People who choose to prioritise buying a home have typically made sacrifices to do so: fewer foreign holidays, meals out or other luxuries. Through no fault of their own, their prudence would be punished by a Mansion Tax.’ Read more on the Daily Mail website.

Labour To Only Tax Homes Worth Over £2m

Labour has moved to reassure people with homes worth between £1m and £2m that they would not be dragged into the mansion tax the party would impose if it wins power in next May’s election. Ed Balls, the shadow Chancellor,  announced that someone with a property worth between £2m and £3m would pay an extra £250 a month – doubling the average council tax bill for homes in the top band. He said owners of properties worth tens of millions would make “a much bigger contribution” and that Labour will consider making overseas owners with second homes in the UK pay an extra amount. Read more on the Independent website.

Mansion Tax: More than A Third of People Think It's Unfair

A new poll by Rightmove indicates that nearly four in ten people think Labour’s proposal for a ‘mansion tax’ would be unfair tax to impose. Rightmove data shows that less than one per cent of all properties currently on the market on Rightmove are priced at over £2million - the suggested cut-off mark -  and of those nearly three quarters are in London, and one in six in the South East. Read more on the Rightmove website.

Miliband's Plan for Mansion Tax Draws Fire from Top Labour MPs

Ed Miliband is facing resistance from senior Labour MPs in London.  Former Labour local government minister, Nick Raynsford described the plan as "good politics but bad policy". He said what was urgently needed was a revaluation of council tax for the first time since 1991, to create extra bands for the highest-value properties as the basis for a "progressive" tax on property. Raynsford said the current system, under which people in properties worth just over £320,000 pay the same council tax as those in homes worth tens of millions, was "grossly unfair" and a "complete nonsense". Reform of council tax was the way forward, rather than a mansion tax, which would create many anomalies and be complex to introduce. Senior Labour figures fear that, under Miliband's plan, people who are "asset rich but cash poor" – having seen the value of their properties rise – will be unfairly hit by the new tax, with some being driven out of their homes. Read more on the Observer website.

Miliband Pledges to Use Mansion Tax to Tackle Crisis in NHS

Labour would use the proceeds of a mansion tax on homes worth more than £2m to head off a funding crisis in the NHS. In his speech to the Labour conference in Manchester, Mr Miliband promised to save the NHS amid forecasts of a £30bn funding gap by 2020. Using some of the £2bn raised from Labour’s proposed high value property tax will be seen as a move to soak the rich rather than ask ordinary taxpayers to top up the health budget. Mapping out his 10-year “national mission” to transform Britain, Mr Miliband pledged that the number of first-time home buyers would be doubled to 400,000 a year under a Labour Government. Read more on the Independent website.

Tory Coffers Benefit From Fears of Mansion Tax

High-end property developers, whose profits could be hit by a mansion tax, are bankrolling the Conservative Party to the tune of almost a million pounds. Electoral records show that in the past two years, property companies have begun donating to the Conservatives for the first time – contributing just under £800,000 to party coffers. The scale of donations underlines fears in the industry that a future Labour government or Lib/Lab coalition would impose punitive taxes on top-end property, triggering a market slump. Residential property companies and their owners now appear to be the biggest financial supporters of the Conservative Party after the financial sector, and will be crucial to helping the Tories to outspend Labour next year. Read more on the Independent website.

Call To Reboot Council Tax to Fund Affordable Homes

The British Property Federation (BPF) is urging all political parties to commit to a full revaluation of council tax in their election manifestos. The call follows research by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) which suggests the council tax system needs to be 'restored to fairness'. The BPF says that additional income generated by reform should be spent on affordable housing in or near to the areas in which it was raised. This would help areas of the UK, London in particular, to meet "affordable housing requirements and maintain a level of diversity that a mansion tax would not achieve," the BPF says. Read more on 24dash.

One of the Most Destructive Taxes of the Past 40 Years Could Soon Be Axed

Danny Alexander’s decision to ditch his party’s commitment to a wealth tax on expensive properties – the infamous mansion tax – and to replace it instead by additional council tax-style bands, represents one of the bravest policy reversals of recent years. The seismic nature of the shift, which still needs to be approved by a deeply sceptical Lib Dem membership, has gone largely unnoticed, partly because it is being downplayed by Alexander. But if it is also eventually adopted by the Labour Party, as seems likely, it would represent a major improvement in the Left’s attitude towards the taxation of property. Extending the council tax, while objectionable, is less pernicious than introducing a completely new wealth tax. Read more on the Daily Telegraph website.

Treasury Officials Have Begun Work on Mansion Tax

A mansion tax could be imposed as early as next year and officials have already put in “a lot of effort” to make it work, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury has revealed.  Danny Alexander said enough preparation had been completed that it might be possible to make the new tax one of the first measures brought in by whoever wins the 2015 election. He maintained that there was growing support for a tax on the wealthiest homes, a measure which has been championed by his Party, the Liberal Democrats, and also has the support of the Labour Party.  Read more on the Independent website.

Labour Mayoral Candidates Cast Doubt on Mansion Tax

Three Labour figures tipped to run as London mayor have expressed reservations about their party's proposed "mansion tax" – a key policy championed by the shadow chancellor, Ed Balls. Dame Tessa Jowell, Diane Abbott and David Lammy, who are all possible candidates in 2016, raised doubts about the charge on houses worth more than £2m which the party has pledged to introduce to pay for a lower 10p starting rate of tax. They were asked about the issue as they appeared alongside a fourth fellow Labour mayoral hopeful, shadow infrastructure minister Lord Adonis, at an event hosted by Progress magazine about how Labour can win votes in London in 2015. Read more on the Guardian website.

Cameron Rules Out Mansion Tax

David Cameron has flatly rejected a "wealth tax", despite Nick Clegg warning earlier this month that a levy on £2 million homes would be a "red line" policy in any future coalition talks. In an interview on the BBC's Andrew Marr show, Mr Cameron insisted that his future tax policies would not punish people who generate wealth and save their assets responsibly. Asked if this meant no mansion tax if he is Prime Minister after 2015, Mr Cameron replied: "That's correct." Read more on the Daily Telegraph website.

Labour Conference: Housing Round-Up

Housing will become a "great national priority" under a Labour government, said shadow housing minister Jack Dromey at the Labour party conference – and the range of plans that emerged appeared to support that. After a long policy silence, Labour announced a string of housing plans, including;

• Increase housebuilding rates to 200,000 a year by 2020
• Use-it-or-lose-it deals for developers
• Mansion tax
• Cities given the 'right to grow'
• Repeal the bedroom tax
• Scrapping the affordable rent programme
• … but the right-to-buy will remain

For more details of these plans go to the Guardian website.

Mansion Tax to Hit 775,000 Homes

The proposed mansion tax will hit 775,000 homes over 25 years but its revenue targets will not be met by the current plans for a £2 million threshold, a new report has revealed.  The research, by property consultancy Knight Frank, concludes that the proposed threshold and tax rate would deliver a gross annual receipt of £1.3 billion, 24% below the Liberal Democrat estimate of £1.7bn and 35% below Labour’s £2bn estimate.  The figure represents an average annual payment of £23,595 per property. The report says that in order to raise the targeted revenue, the value threshold for the tax would need to be reduced from £2m to either £1.5m (to raise £1.7bn) or £1.25m (to raise £2bn). Read more on 24dash.