Land Tax

[nxy]

According to the Telegraph one of the ideas doing the rounds to plug Labour's £22 billion black hole is a Land tax.

We already pay this as a local authority tax in France and mine works out at about 1% of it's value per annum. It's paid by the landowner but tenants pay their landlord a percentage on top of their rent.

What do people think? Why shouldn't landowners pay something for the use of local services when neighbouring houses pay council tax?

I suspect I will need more than a tin hat for this one.

 

[Badshot]

I'll just say.
If our land values and rents are comparable to yours I'd have no problem.

 

[Grass And Grain]

@nxy What local services are the landowners getting?

 

[DrWazzock]

That would make the decision to sell up a no brainer. Land value collapse. Banks collapse.
And we pay council tax on farmhouses like everybody else as it is.
What a load of nonsense.
It amazes me that’s there is this widely held view that businesses have vast untapped sources of wealth to tax. Well we haven’t unless you count our capital in that. But if you take our capital our bsuinesses fold. Then who are you going to tax?

 

[HatsOff]

The 'land of the free' have land taxes. There's nothing intrinsically wrong with the concept but it's all in the detail.

If the land tax is supposed to encourage efficient use of land then we need wholesale reform of planning to actually allow efficient use of land.

Otherwise we need zoning laws and huge bureaucracy to establish and update the supposed value.

No easy answers.

 

[HatsOff]

@nxy What local services are the landowners getting?

Roads.

 

[Bald Rick]

According to the Telegraph one of the ideas doing the rounds to plug Labour's £22 billion black hole is a Land tax.

We already pay this as a local authority tax in France and mine works out at about 1% of it's value per annum. It's paid by the landowner but tenants pay their landlord a percentage on top of their rent.

What do people think? Why shouldn't landowners pay something for the use of local services when neighbouring houses pay council tax?

I suspect I will need more than a tin hat for this one.

We all pay Council tax (& it goes up every year) on a banding system. Farmhouses are allowed to step back one band but for two houses, we are paying over £5k already ... AND we have to haul the bins 1/4m up our drive because the council contractors will not enter private property.

1% of an average UK farm would be a hefty bill indeed seeing as £10k/ac is not an uncommon value these days

 

[Henarar]

@nxy What local services are the landowners getting?

What local services is the land getting ?
most landowners have a house and pay for local services so you need to ask what services the land gets not the owner.

 

[nxy]

What local services is the land getting ?
most landowners have a house and pay for local services so you need to ask what services the land gets not the owner.

Police, Fire brigade, roads, local planning officers, trading standards,,.......

 

[Grass And Grain]

Roads.

The land doesn't use the roads. It's vehicles which use roads.

Vehicle Excise Duty is meant to cover that. Up to gov to set that at a rate they're content with.

What local services is the land getting ?
most landowners have a house and pay for local services so you need to ask what services the land gets not the owner.

Yes, sorry, you put it in a better way than me, I meant the land itself (although it will have a landowner). As you say, landowners usually live somewhere, and that house will pay council tax to cover the services provided by local authority.

 

[Yale]

Simple answer is if you tax land £50 an acre then you’d have to up the farm payment by £50 an acre. The countryside is being bled dry as it is!

Just put 2% on VAT, simples, everyone pays it and the ones who spend more pay more.

https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5801/cmselect/cmtreasy/664/66408.htm

 

[spin cycle]

I don't think it's a terrible idea....something needs to be done to stop big owners hoovering up every bit and let more ppl afford just a little piece of land

trouble is at £10k/ac ...1% is £100 which is punitive

 

[HatsOff]

The land doesn't use the roads. It's vehicles which use roads.

Vehicle Excise Duty is meant to cover that. Up to gov to set that at a rate they're content with.

I assume you fly to your fields then? Roads provide access to land.

We don't have hypothecated taxes in the UK, but putting that to one side, it is actually local council budgets that pay for upkeep of non-trunk roads and they don't receive VED. Also, everyone has the right to use roads - pedestrians, horses, bicycles, tractors. Not just those that pay VED.

 

[devonbeef]

well they will finish of livestock farming in a stroke, there is no spare money, you only have to look at published grassland farms average incomes, to see that, non dairy, it would just be a land grab on a huge scale

 

[capfits]

Think land value tax rather than land tax.
Land in Central London will have higher value than Sutherland

Why you may ask,
More folk live London and assume has more services that need paying for, maintained than the Sutherland bog.

 

[fgc325j]

According to the Telegraph one of the ideas doing the rounds to plug Labour's £22 billion black hole is a Land tax.

We already pay this as a local authority tax in France and mine works out at about 1% of it's value per annum. It's paid by the landowner but tenants pay their landlord a percentage on top of their rent.

What do people think? Why shouldn't landowners pay something for the use of local services when neighbouring houses pay council tax?

I suspect I will need more than a tin hat for this one.

In that article they suggest a rate of 0.44% of the value of the land, same rate for houses - instead of council tax. Also they want properties, which were last valued
in the early 1990's, when there was a slump in property values, to be revalued - that fact makes cold sweat run down my back.

 

[fgc325j]

The land doesn't use the roads. It's vehicles which use roads.

Vehicle Excise Duty is meant to cover that. Up to gov to set that at a rate they're content with.


Yes, sorry, you put it in a better way than me, I meant the land itself (although it will have a landowner). As you say, landowners usually live somewhere, and that house will pay council tax to cover the services provided by local authority.

Vehicle exercise Duty is meant to cover that - they now realise that, with the increasing number of electric vehicles, which are exempt, the tax take is lower. And to compensate they are looking at a mileage charge instead, i.e the more miles you travel the more you pay. That'll open a can of worms because nearly all consumer
goods these days travel by lorry/vans.

 

[roscoe erf]

Roads.

Paid for by road tax and fuel duty be careful what you wish for

 

[HatsOff]

Paid for by road tax and fuel duty be careful what you wish for

See my other reply - unless it's a motorway or large A-road, the local council pays for road upkeep.

Don't see many field gates off the M1.

 

[roscoe erf]

Police, Fire brigade, roads, local planning officers, trading standards,,.......

Really the land gets all that not already paid for by the farmhouse