Stealth Tax number ... is it over 200 now?

We learned last week that there is likely to be a licence scheme for those who own houses and let them out. This "landlord tax" is expected to earn the chancellor £60 million, presumably when things get back to normal.

This is a quick reaction to a review enquiry carried out by York University which claimed that private rented property is often not of good enough quality, (although it had improved!). The enquiry recommended a registration scheme.

It seems aimed particularly at those who have bought property with a view to letting it. The Council of Mortgage Lenders estimates there are currently 1.2 million mortgages on property to let properties. As the proposal is that each will have to pay an annual £50 registration fee, £60 million will result, although given a likely expansion in government bureaucracy the government coffers will receive a net result much less.

The effect on landlords is to add to their current burdens which include gas safety checks, tenancy deposit schemes and energy performance certificates. Experts are predicting that good landlords will be increasingly driven out of the market, (and their properties bought at knock- down prices by social landlords - so that's alright then), but will do little to deter less scrupulous landlords.

It is early days, and we still have to learn what practices and to what degree would lead to a withdrawal of certification.

You would have to look a lot further to find clearer examples of the extension of expensive and ineffective bureaucratic control which will drive out good producers but have much less impact on those who cause the real trouble.