Selective licensing has been a bone of contention with landlords for some time now. It was introduced to help local authorities identify which properties in their area are landlord owned, the idea being that criminal landlords would find it harder to hide amongst legitimate landlords. Unfortunately the schemes are costly and the cost is inevitably passed on to the tenant in the form of higher rents, which is why these schemes have been dubbed as a ‘tenants’ tax’.
RLA Campaigning for Change
The RLA has been campaigning for a long time for such schemes to be scrapped in favour of a far simpler approach. They have pointed out that council tax registration forms can include a section asking for further details of whether a property is rented (and if so who the landlord is) or owner occupied.
New Housing and Planning Bill
The new Housing and Planning Bill published this week now contains measures that will allow councils to collect the information they need via council tax bills. This negates the need for expensive selective licensing schemes that serve only as a ‘cash cow’ for local authorities.
“The Housing Bill makes clear that landlord licensing schemes are not needed and serve only as a money raising exercise by councils,” says RLA Policy Director, David Smith.
“Local authorities now have serious questions to answer. Why are they charging good landlords when they can collect the information they need to drive out criminal landlords using council tax registration forms for free? It’s time for councils to think again and bring to an end to the tenants’ tax once and for all.”
