Land for the Many – Not for Landlords

Land for the Many – Not for Landlords

8:13 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago 84

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The Labour Party have commissioned an ‘independent’ report titled “Land for the Many” that proposes changes in the way land in the UK is used and governed.

Key proposal headlines include:

Tenancies should be open-ended, and landlords should lose their power to evict a tenant who has not broken the terms of the tenancy agreement for the first three years of the tenancy agreement, and should have to provide grounds for eviction after that point.

Cap on annual permissible rent increases, at no more than the rate of wage inflation or consumer price inflation (whichever is lower)

Replace the council tax with a progressive property tax. This should be payable by owners, not tenants.

Stamp Duty Land Tax should be phased out for those buying homes to live in themselves, and capital gains tax for second homes and investment properties should be increased

Buy to Let mortgages should be more firmly regulated and restricted.

Discourage land and housing from being treated as financial assets by encouraging banks to redirect lending into productive sectors, and encourage a more efficient use of the existing housing stock.

The guiding principle of the report:

“The pursuit of luxury has been a common theme among thinkers on both right and left. But it is evident that there is neither the physical nor the ecological space for everyone to enjoy private luxury. If we all sought to own our own tennis courts, swimming pools, playbarns and art collections, Newcastle would need to expand to the size of London, and London would cover much of England.

But there is enough physical and ecological space for everyone to enjoy public luxury. We have room, even on these crowded islands, for magnificent parks, playing fields, public swimming pools, urban nature reserves and allotments sufficient to meet the needs of all. The expansion of public wealth in land creates more space for everyone, while the expansion of private wealth in land reduces the space available for others, at the cost of most people’s quality of life. The guiding principle of this report is private sufficiency and public luxury.”

Click Here to download the full report.

James Brokenshire, Housing Secretary, said: “These proposals are extraordinary and deeply damaging in equal measure. Labour will stop at nothing to hammer families with more tax and make home ownership a pipe dream for future generations.

“Plans to seize land into public ownership also show Labour’s true colours of more and more state control. This tax bombshell for families would mean family homes with gardens paying far more and higher taxes on pensioners by abolishing the single person discount.”

Labour’s spokesman for the Cabinet Office, said: “For too long, people across the country have had little or no say over the decisions that affect their communities and the places in which they live.  So much of this can be traced back to the broken system of land ownership. Concentration of land in the hands of a few has led to unwanted developments, unaffordable house prices, financial crises and environmental degradation.

“Labour is committed to tackling these head on and delivering a fundamental shift in wealth and power from the few to the many.”


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Comments

Neil Patterson

8:35 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

If you add rent caps to council tax payable by landlords many will just face Bankruptcy.

Whiteskifreak Surrey

8:53 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

After reading that there is only one alternative - sell sell sell. I just cannot believe what I am reading, this is a lot worse that communism in former Eastern and Central Europe. Pure Marxism.
I hope those here who were not afraid of Commie Corbynov now see their true colours may just revise their optimistic approach to that idiocy.

Kathy Evans

9:37 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

I wonder how many affordable houses My Corbyn is going to build on his own property and how many extra people he will house for a pittance. It's easy to say things like that when you are rich and your salary is paid for by the tax payer

NW Landlord

10:28 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

Sell sell sell simple

Terry Fitzpatrick

11:03 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

There is a way of building houses on land that councils currently own. Billions of pounds of it. Look at http://www.helalabbas.com and the article Small is Beautiful. This guy was a leader of Tower Hamlets Council and has actually run something.

Dylan Morris

11:05 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

I’m surprised there’s no mention of Right To Buy for private tenants. Also no mention of removal of landlords’ biggest ”perk” the tax relief they claim on new boilers, buildings insurance, council tax, ground rent and service charges, repairs and maintenance etc. And of course scrapping of the 20% tax credit on mortgage interest. Labour missing a few tricks here.

Chris Clare

11:14 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

With the additional income taxation and making LLs responsible for the property tax will make PRS rentals only affordable to the wealthy (the rule of unintended consequences)

Couple that with LLs leaving the sector and lending limitations, would mean that the PRS would be further curtailed thus forcing rents yet higher (rule of supply and demand).

This would then mean our communist government would have to build, on a massive scale, public housing. The only thing we would be missing would be cameras in every home and we have jumped all the way to 1984!

A Labour government truly frightens me. I remember my father saying, when I was a kid, "If Labour get in I'm leaving this country". I never really understood that statement, until now.

rbinscotland

11:28 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

Corbyn (idiot) "if a tenant doesn't break any terms of the tenancy within 3 years". So if lets say £500 pcm and they decide not to pay - you wait till they owe £18,000 before you start the eviction process. Or have i got it wrong?

Gromit

11:34 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

Reply to the comment left by Chris Clare at 04/06/2019 - 11:14If you read the report is proposes cap on rent rises to the lower of CPI or average wages.
It also proposes tenancies for life, so it'll be back to the bad old days with sitting tenants and only being able, effectively, to sell to another Landlord at massive discounts to market value.

Mark Alexander - Founder of Property118

11:35 AM, 4th June 2019, About 5 years ago

Why do I get the impression that, if he had his way, Corbyn would have all landlords lined up and shot as traitors to his communistic beliefs and then seize control of all of their assets 'for the good of the people'?

Thank goodness I no longer live in the UK, he will never take away my freedom!

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