Outbreak of common sense at the London Assembly.

From City AM:

Scrap council tax and business rates and replace them with a land value tax to encourage development, says London Assembly member

London’s housing shortage could be partially alleviated by replacing business rates and council tax with a tax on the value of land, a member of the London Assembly has argued today in a new report.

The tax changes could lead to the release of nearly 2,000 hectares of land for development, which would provide enough space for 275,000 new homes in the capital, according to the research from Tom Copley. The role of the London Assembly is to ensure the Mayor delivers on their promises.

It's City AM so they are wilfully misreporting as per usual. The report clearly stated that Stamp Duty Land Tax would have to go as well. Things in London are so skewed that SDLT on residential sales raises as much Council Tax, and SDLT is arguably a worse tax. Being City AM, they round off their article with two tired old KLNs, "What about valuations and how do we find out who owns what?". Duh. LVT is just Council Tax or Business Rates with more accurate valuations.

Disappointingly, they didn't adopt all of what I submitted, so they don't propose getting rid of section 106 agreements and the Community Infrastructure Levy, both of which discourage new construction (this is clearly something which the London Assembly has the power to do), let alone getting rid of Inheritance Tax and the TV licence fee (which are the obvious next steps but would require some devolution of powers or back room deals).