Preparing for Land Value Taxation in Britain

This project centered on a ‘property tax stakeholder’ postal survey and meetings with experts to discover what obstacles were perceived to inhibit implementation of land value taxation (LVT) in Britain. The survey indicated strong underlying support for many principles of LVT: that it could assist urban renewal; it encourages improvements to property; and it is more just than present business rates. Overwhelming support exists for conducting pilots of LVT before any nationwide decision on its implementation. However, there is a need for tools to enable the land value concept to be visualized, and hence better understood, even by property professionals. The main conclusion is that detailed proposals for a pilot of split-rate LVT to replace the Uniform Business Rate need to be prepared before any serious debate about the merits of a ‘tax shift’ towards land values can occur.