Agenda item

For Council to clarify the policy as handed down from its meeting on 13 December 2012.

(All Members present except Councillors Bairstow and Goodes had been granted a dispensation to take part in the debate and vote on this item)

The Council considered a report (Agenda Item 3) which sought to clarify the policy on Council Tax discount for vacant properties as handed down from its meeting on 13th December 2012.

MOTION: Proposed by Councillor Roger Croft and seconded by Councillor Laszlo Zverko:

That the Council:

“revise the decision from 13th December 2012 so that, with regard to empty and unoccupied property formerly within exemption class "C", it reads as follows - Limiting the duration of exemption class “C” (empty and unoccupied property) to a maximum of 28 days per unoccupied period and allowing 100% relief during that period.  The 28 day period free of council tax charges will be allowed when a property is first vacated, after which full council tax will become payable. If the property should become occupied during a period of 6 months commencing from a date of vacation, and is subsequently vacated during that same 6 month period, a further 28 day “free” period will not apply.”

Councillor Roger Croft presented the report which asked Council to clarify the policy regarding rules for Council Tax discount on empty and unoccupied property which had been agreed by Council in December 2012. This need had arisen in response to the identification of the 2012 report’s resolutions as being capable of a different interpretation than had been intended.

In December 2012 Council considered a report entitled “Technical Reforms to Council Tax”. This report made various recommendations to change council tax discounts for empty properties following the relaxation of various statutory rules and the introduction of local discretion on the extent to which relief was allowed.

The relaxation of statutory rules coincided with a reduction in government grant when council tax benefit was replaced by local council tax reduction schemes. The report’s recommendations focused on restriction of relief for vacant property in order to generate additional council tax income. This was a means to bridge the gap between the cost of council tax reduction and the reducing level of Government grant.

All recommendations were adopted by Council as policy to be applied from 1 April 2013.

Recommendation (5) to the report was “Limiting the duration of exemption class c (empty and unoccupied property) to a maximum of four weeks in any six month period and allowing 100% relief during that period”.

The reference to a six month period related to the churn on shorter term tenancies – the intention being that, if a property were to be occupied and vacated for a second time before the expiry of a six month period, a further period of discount would not be allowed. However, recent events had indicated that this recommendation might be interpreted as giving longer term empty properties a recurring entitlement to a 28 day period free of council tax every six months. This was never the intention of the recommendation. The purpose of the December 2012 report was to seek the means to generate council tax income rather than to introduce new discounts. Members would have been aware of these factors and it was assumed that they took their decision based on the intention behind the Officer’s recommendation.

Council were being asked to revise the text of the recommendation so that it was clear that an additional 28 day free period would not arise at the end of each six month period during which a property remained vacant.

The revised text recommended to Council was as follows:

“Limiting the duration of exemption class C (empty and unoccupied property) to a maximum of 28 days per unoccupied period and allowing 100% relief during that period. The 28 day period free of council tax charges would be allowed when a property was first vacated, after which full council tax would become payable. If the property should become occupied during a period of six months commencing from a date of vacation, and was subsequently vacated during that same six month period, a further 28 day “free” period would not apply.”

The Motion was put to the meeting and duly RESOLVED.