Highland tourist tax will have ‘fairly negligible’ impact overall, says Living Rent Highland as it maintains people will still visit region
A Highland tourist tax will not stop visitors coming to the region, say campaigners calling for some of the money to be used to address the housing crisis.
Members of Living Rent Highland delivered an 800-name petition to Highland Council’s headquarters earlier this week, calling for the introduction of an eight per cent levy and for £1.5 million to be ringfenced to build more council homes, to repair and retrofit existing council stock and bring empty council homes back into use.
Although they acknowledge there is opposition to a proposed visitor levy and sympathise with concerned business owners, they say the housing crisis is the biggest crisis facing the region.
The petition was handed in on Monday as Highland Council’s public consultation on a visitor levy came to a close.
The council says a visitor levy of five per cent could raise about £10 million a year which could be spent on public infrastructure which is under pressure due to a huge number of tourists.
Feargus Murray (28) is a member of Living Rent Highland which campaigns for better rights for tenants, protections against rent increases, evictions and poor-quality housing.
Speaking as the petition was handed in, he believed a visitor levy would have a “fairly negligible” impact overall.
“People are still going to come to the Highlands,” he said.
“It is a wonderful beautiful part of the world.
“The housing crisis is really the biggest crisis we have in the Highlands at the moment.”
He said many hospitality businesses were suffering because of a lack of affordable housing.
Stephanie Mann said there were 8000 people on Highland Council’s social housing list and called for the introduction of a model similar to one in Edinburgh where the council has committed to spending £5 million visitor levy funds each year on improving social housing.
But the idea has prompted disagreement and a lively debate on social media.
One person posted: “Small hotel owners across the Highlands are barely breaking even as it is.
“Some try to stay open year-round at break even or at a loss in winter to provide staff year-round employment.
“Many have done their sums and realised it's not financially feasible to continue that model if the levy comes through.”
Another person said those attending hospital appointments, cancer treatments, expectant mums, children travelling to sports events and music competitions, relief bank nurses and doctors would have to pay, too.
“This affects every single resident in the Highland and Islands area,” they posted.
“Please read full legislation before thinking it will be a magic wand cure all. It's not.”
But another post stated: “Getting quality and affordable housing up here is really tough.
“Using some of the tourist levy to help with this seems like a no brainer.”
