Last week there was news that The British Property Federation made a public call for the property industry to back a petition calling for the empty rates hike to be scrapped. The federation says this could cost businesses in the UK an estimated £400m a year.

The tax on empty properties is known in the Industry as the ‘bombsite Britain’ tax, full business rates are levied on unoccupied offices, shops and warehouses and has famously led to millions of square feet of property being demolished since its introduction.

The suggestion from the politicians that it encourages Landlords to let their property and not leave it empty is rather misjudged.

The petition asks the government to raise the Empty Property Rates (EPR) threshold from £2,600 Rateable Value (RV) and reinstate the £18,000 RV threshold previously in place.

The Directgov website recently introduced a provision meaning that if the petition attracts 100,000 signatures then it will be debated in parliament. The empty rates petition, despite being launched only last week, has already attracted over 1300 supporters.

The link is here

I encourage you to sign up. empty Rates hurst the Industry in lots of ways. It is penal at a time when landlords can’t afford the penalties. We have seen some demolition of perfectly good buildings – leading to gappy-teeth street scenes in some places.

The other major issue is the developers can’t afford to get new buildings to a pint where they are ready for occupation – as the minute they do, they pay Rates. Sometimes this means that we miss out on inward investment opportunities.

This tax needs revision – the property Industry doesn’t need any more bad news…