The Empty Homes Agency is an Head Office: Northern Office:

independent campaigning charity, which The Empty Homes Agency The Empty Homes Agency
exists to highlight the waste of empty 195-197 Victoria Street PO Box 3609
property in England and works with others London Barnsley
to devise and promote sustainable SW1E 5NE S75 1WW
solutions to bring empty property back Phone: 020 7828 6288 Phone/Fax: 01226 390 093
into use. Fax: 020 7828 7006 Mobile: 07719 798 033
Email: info@emptyhomes.com
Web: www.emptyhomes.com

Council Tax discount to kick start empty homes work

Answers to Parliamentary Questions have revealed that a staggering £72

million was raised last year by the abolition of the council tax discount on
empty homes.

The Questions were asked by David Kidney, MP for Stafford, who says this
money could be put to good use:

”Next month the Government's grant of new powers to local authorities to

tackle private empty homes become operational. With the new powers under
Part 4 of the Housing Act 2004, local authorities will be able to obtain “Empty
Dwelling Management Orders” in respect of private homes that are empty
long-term.

“As one of the MPs who pressed the then-Housing Minister, Keith Hill to
include this new power in the 2004 Act, I'm delighted see this power is now to
become operational. Yet I am concerned that local authorities will not have
the funding to make the best use of these new powers. Answers to recent
Parliamentary Questions that I tabled demonstrate how much money could be
available if the Government would agree to ring-fence the additional money
raised from the abolition of the council tax discount on empty homes.”

Jonathan Ellis, Chief Executive of the Empty Homes Agency, which led the
campaign for the new empty homes powers, agrees:

“We think that the Government has missed trick on this issue, and we would
urge them to consider ring-fencing this money it only for two years to act as a
pump prime funding for these new powers”.

This call for the transfer of resources to local authorities is further supported
by Lord Sandy Bruce Lockhart, the chairman of the Local Government
Association, who as leader of Kent County Council did much to prioritise
action on empty homes.

Further support was forthcoming from Baroness Maddock, previously Liberal

Democrat spokesperson on housing issues in the House of Lords, who said:

"I and others argued during the passage of the 2004 Housing Act that
additional tax from empty properties should be spent on bringing empty
homes back into use."

The Written Answers to the Parliamentary Questions on 3rd May 2006 also
revealed that 186 local authorities (or 53 per cent of billing authorities) have
 The Empty Homes Agency is an Head Office: Northern Office:
independent campaigning charity, which The Empty Homes Agency The Empty Homes Agency
exists to highlight the waste of empty 195-197 Victoria Street PO Box 3609
property in England and works with others London Barnsley
to devise and promote sustainable SW1E 5NE S75 1WW
solutions to bring empty property back Phone: 020 7828 6288 Phone/Fax: 01226 390 093
into use. Fax: 020 7828 7006 Mobile: 07719 798 033
Email: info@emptyhomes.com
Web: www.emptyhomes.com

used their discretionary powers to reduce the council tax discount offered to
long-term empty homes.

Local authorities were given the discretion to abolish the council tax discount
on long-term empty homes in the 2003 Local Government Act. This change
came about as a long-running campaign by the Empty Homes Agency, which
had argued that the empty property discount was a perverse incentive to keep
property empty in high demand areas.

Ends

For further information please contact

 Shashi Ioannides, Communications Manager at the Empty Homes

Agency on 020 7 828 6288
 David Kidney MP tel. 07966 378844