Hospitality businesses are warning of a jobs bloodbath as Andy Burnham launches a huge ‘tourist tax’ raid, with England’s mayors given new powers to impose uncapped levies on overnight stays. The Mail has the story.
Ministers are laying out plans for a massive ‘tourist tax’ in England today as fears grow that it could fuel a jobs bloodbath.
Mayors and other local leaders will get powers to impose charges on accommodation in Labour’s latest move to raise revenues.
Previously a flat fee had been mooted – but it is now set to be a percentage of the cost of overnight stays, with no upper limit.
That could add hundreds of pounds to the costs of holidays, with businesses warning that tens of thousands of roles in hospitality are at risk.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan is considering a charge of up to 5%, potentially raising £580 million a year for his coffers.
Angela Rayner will give more details of the proposals at a meeting with mayors in ‘No. 10 North’ later today.
Plans for the tax were first announced by Sir Keir Starmer, after similar schemes were introduced by the devolved governments in Scotland and Wales.
But they appear to have been ramped up by Andy Burnham.
Charges of a similar nature already exist across Europe, with the revenue used to fund local services. Mayors would decide how to invest the money raised from the levy.
Burnham introduced a City Visitor Charge while mayor of Manchester in April 2023, at £1 per room per night.
There have previously been estimates that a 3% levy in London could raise £350 million a year. But Lord Khan has now indicated the charge could be up to 5%, which might bring in more than £580 million.
Tory Tees Valley mayor Lord Houchen has flatly rejected the idea of a tourist tax, while Kemi Badenoch has condemned the idea.
Groups representing the tourism trade have warned about the impact of the levy and called for consistency in how the tax operates across different regions.
Allen Simpson, Chief Executive of UK Hospitality, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme a new tourism tax in Edinburgh is “already having damaging effects”.
He said holidays in the UK are “already more expensive” than they appear because of higher VAT, even before the tourist tax.
Simpson added: “What we’re talking about here is an open-ended power for mayors to set tourism taxes at any level they want.
“And remember that if you go to Paris, if you go to Rome, if you go to Berlin, you’re paying a small tourism tax, but it’s capped.”
He said residents in communities which rely on tourism and hospitality would see jobs put at risk.
Worth reading in full.
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Will it apply to, ahem, all hotel residents?
Not really – they don’t pay the bill, we do… so the government will be taxing themselves…
If Defence of the Realm (a Government’s primary responsibility) can be sacrificed by the lunatics in Government in order to pay (undeserved) Social Security, destroying the Hospitality and Tourist Industry is a no-brainer.
How would social security operate if the Country was being attacked, bombed, about to be invaded?
Dear Brits, when your gov’t is working this hard to destroy what is left of little Britain, I would honestly look for escape routes. Because there is no doubt as each day goes by and another Labour missive
leaks out, Labour ain’t looking after you.
All western democracies are pushing exactly the same agenda. I imagine the government is delighted that white indigenous people up sticks and move, it plays to their agenda.
You can run but you cannot hide ( as far as all western democracies are concerned).
Better to stay and fight maybe.
I’m going to be running & trying to hide.
I’ve spent the last 5 years trying to convince myself that staying and fighting is the right thing to do, but have failed to find one thing worth fighting for.
Any fighting will be done over the last remaining scraps of our inheritance. As British people we should be ashamed of what we have allowed to happen.
There ain’t no fight left, from what I can see…
Unless I arrive on a dinghy, I am clearly not welcome in my own country 🤔
Since not every district will have a mayor then there will be regional advantages for somem hospitality businesses which will upset the pulling in of “wealth” for mayoralities.
Burnham was very much much part of globalist billionaire Bloomberg’s mayoral agenda.
https://www.bloomberg.org/government-innovation/spurring-innovation-in-cities/mayors-challenge/
And of course the acceleration of Agenda 30 programme is at the heart of the global mayor movement – in effect, adding local government action to national government to accelerate the agenda.
https://www.globalcovenantofmayors.org/press/the-global-covenant-of-mayors-welcomes-major-bloomberg-philanthropies-investment-to-power-next-wave-of-local-climate-action/
Oh goody – lots of empty hotel rooms. We can put more migrants in them!
Irrefutable economic fact: the more a thing is taxed, the less of it you get.
Cigarettes, alcohol for example are taxed to reduce consumption, why is so difficult for these dollops to understand if you tax labour, economic activity, investment, more than the less of these things we shall get?
Apparently Andy Capp and his Toytown councillors now ru(i)ing the UK believe they can tax, spend, borrow the Country to growth.
The government follow this principle themselves for things like the sugar tax, then deny its effectiveness when they do something like this.
If local authorities don’t want to charge more, they won’t have to. Just like a free market, in effect. Whether the local services are good enough to attract tourists, that’s another question.
Soon only the rich will be able to afford going on holiday. As the government hates the rich they’ll be pleased because the tourist tax will then only be a tax on the rich.
Also, when they build all the attractions in the 15min cities who will want to go anywhere else but home?
Of course it makes sense.
Soon the rich will go on holiday and not come back.
If they are like my son, they have already left for permanent holiday locations.
Genius. They can use the revenue raised by the tax to pay benefits to all the people who will lose their jobs. Socialism in action.
The state is completely broke. That’s in spite of the fact that it collects more taxes than ever. You could say, the state is like a degenerate, out of control substance abuser that spends all it has, then some more and is constantly in desperate search for a way to pay for its next fix.
Today it’s a tourism tax. Tomorrow it’ll be something else. And the day after something else still.
Anything but face up to its addiction and kick the habit that is destroying everything around it.
A good way to put it. In other news, 10 year gilt yields have gone above 5.3% today, 30 year yields scratching at 6.0%. In both cases more than a whole 1.0% north of where they spiked in October 22. What a comfort it is to know that our Prime Minister isn’t going to be worrying his pretty little head about them.
Paging Liz Truss…
Morally as well as financially.
Beard tax, window tax, air tax!
It is not the money they are after, although initially it will be a welcome benefit enabling more money laundering and localised waste of money benefit schemes, it is the loss of jobs which is the primary aim. And if the required job losses and business destructions do not arrive then the tax will simply have to be increased.
Build back better and all that.
“with the revenue used to fund local services. Mayors would decide how to invest the money raised from the levy”
..for important things like gay zebra crossing and the outer Mongolian pitywinkle protection fund I’ll guess!
Taxing you all to poverty.
They will tax away tourists. Tourism brings in £250 billion p.a. in revenue.
These clowns are also planning to increase the number of tourists to 50 million p.a. from ~40/45 million.
How does increasing taxes bring in more tourists? Square that circle.
The GBP is already a high currency exchange note. Many tourists come from areas where their specie is quite undervalued vs the GBP meaning that a vacation here is already problematically and prohibitively expensive.
Add in VAT.
This is what the deep state does – one of its few hammers – tax, tax, tax some more.
Need to feed the endless wars, the massive state, the bankrupt NHS, netzero etc etc.