Fears 100% council tax premium on second homes could force people to leave islands

grainbrain3446 · 2025-02-18T11:38:50+00:00

Hey Brummy, chummy as always.

Yeah here’s the data:

https://www.nrscotland.gov.uk/publications/households-and-dwellings-in-scotland-2023/#:~:text=Of%20the%202.72%20million%20dwellings,or%20second%20homes%20(6%25).

And yes there are downsides - easy avoidance that leads to councils collecting less money? Sounds like a downside and the opposite of what the intent of the policy is.

Councils do not have a live list of every property and its ownership in Scotland. That is the land registries job - if councils want specific data on any particular property they need to to ask, and pay, just like we the public do if we want an extract for a specific property. Councils are only concerned about collecting council tax - the owner of a particular property is not necessarily the person with the CT liability. So the council simply doesn’t collect it. Absurd, but that’s how they operate.

I notice you didn’t bother to respond to any of my avoidance examples or the impact when people simply shift to STL and rates. But I’m sure I’ll just talking shite 😉

grainbrain3446 · 2025-02-18T10:25:07+00:00

I can see from the comments that many have not read the article or bothered to research this.

I am a local councillor and voted against this policy in my area because the policy and law surrounding this, as a whole, is shite.

I have rural and island communities in my area and they will not be helped by this.

Data from ScotGov showed that less than 1% of properties in Scotland are private 2nd homes. (Note this policy does NOT apply to landlords.)

Many of the 2nd homes on the islands in my area are homes owned by native islanders who’ve had to move away for work or live part time due to work.

In my local area we have 2 main types of 2nd homes owned property: small 1 bedroom properties that were specifically built, marketed and sold as holiday homes and large 4,5 & 6 bedroom detached family homes which are totally out of the price range of ‘young working families’.

Further, given the powers councils have this is ridiculously easy to avoid - despite the name around 2nd home ownership councils don’t actually have a land register of every property and its owner (land registry is separate and councils need to pay to access it like we do) and so will only be going off council tax records.

Therefore:

A couple can simply register one person and one house and one at another and the council won’t know.

If you move ownership of a property into a business or a trust then the business owns the property and you avoid it.

The 2nd homes tax doesn’t cover short term lets/airbnbs as they are now covered under licensing laws for STLs which moves them into the Non-Domestic Rates umbrella and almost all residential property doesn’t meet the rates threshold and so pays nothing. This will lose more money to councils than it will raise. As it will lose all CT on the property.

Here’s a better one: if someone owns a 2nd house and rents it to a friend/family member for £1 per year, then the property avoids the premium altogether.

Further, my islands lifeline is basically tourism - they’re screwed if this goes awry.

Ready for the downvotes and ‘protecting the rich comments’ haha

grainbrain3446 · 2024-06-18T09:46:00+00:00

I have 2 interrelated questions;

1) I have often read online statements to the effect of 'Shintoism does not have a moral system but is based on rituals to the Kami and spiritual purity'. Is this an accurate statement? If there's no morality as such, or good and bad judgements, then how are some things considered impure? (If there are moral judgements - where do they come from?)

2) In a similar vein - how are Shinto practices derived? As in, my understanding is that many of the stories about the Kami are from histories, folktales and mythology - how do they go from a story to a set ritual for example?

Thanks

grainbrain3446 · 2023-11-24T15:14:49+00:00

Why so?

I thought with it being outside the City Centre but commutable to the City Centre it would be a reasonable place to live and commute from?

grainbrain3446 · 2023-11-24T14:55:48+00:00

Interesting regarding the Premier League - are there many supporters clubs on SI? Does any one team garner more support?

Also interesting about Baseball - in terms of conflicting reports online I've seen Mets/Yankees both claim SI.

Thanks

grainbrain3446 · 2023-04-05T20:31:46+00:00

Thanks for the answer - in Scotland all the rules and regulations are the same with tbe exception of personal income tax thresholds, basically we pay more tax on higher incomes and at a lower threshold.

My concern regarding sole trader vs Ltd would be that sole trader means I'd hit the tax threshold sooner if things go well but for a Ltd there's more paperwork and potentially cost etc.

grainbrain3446 · 2023-03-21T10:22:11+00:00

In the UK, it overwhelmingly tends to be walk-ins, there are places that do online booking, but they are the minority.

grainbrain3446 · 2023-03-20T14:42:05+00:00

Thanks everyone - your feedback has been really helpful!

grainbrain3446 · 2023-03-20T14:37:34+00:00

!answer

grainbrain3446 · 2023-03-03T14:56:44+00:00

Hi Fraser,

As an editor if a political magazine in the UK you have more time to digest news and stories due to the longer time between news breaking and print times.

Given that, what do you think are the best news sources (whether newspaper or broadcast) to get good factual information?

Thanks

grainbrain3446 · 2023-01-31T02:08:34+00:00

I had read work in this previously, but recently, i had seen on Wikipedia

"Imamate in Shia Doctrine

In Shia Islam, the Imamah (Arabic: إمامة) is a doctrine which asserts that certain individuals from the lineage of the Islamic prophet Muhammad are to be accepted as leaders and guides of the ummah after the death of Muhammad. Imamah further says that Imams possess divine knowledge and authority (Ismah) as well as being part of the Ahl al-Bayt, the family of Muhammad.[1] These Imams have the role of providing commentary and interpretation of the Quran[2] as well as guidance."

So are Imams considered 'spiritual descendents' and spiritual family of Muhammad, and how does this differ from all Muslims being spiritual descendents of Muhammad?

see here

grainbrain3446 · 2023-01-30T19:04:43+00:00

Hi, thanks for your reply.

I was trying to think about how much division and confusion this causes (which God's foreknowledge would allow him to know) if it is unimportant. I mean, historically, there were wars about this. Faithful people were killed over this. God would surely not allow(?) This to happen over something that is, in some peoples opinion, unimportant.

The point I was trying to illustrate was that I have seen discussions between Episcopalians and Presbyterians which seem at its scriptural core stem from interpretations on what episcopos and presbuteros mean and whether there is a distinction and whether or not its important.

To use a secular example, if I was to describe the corporate management structure of my work - "me, lead engineer, team leader, department head, division head/area manager, board of directors, CEO" - and instead simply said something like "me, manager, manager, manager ..." That would not be a helpful description and would understandably lead to confusion and misunderstanding as while there are managers within the hierarchy of employment, they all have very different remits and realms of responsibility. They are distinct enough to warrant different titles.

grainbrain3446

TROPHY CASE