Visitor Tax

[al78]

As for moaning about government local and national. We do live in a democracy. You will get the government you deserve.

I use my democratic vote, and have never in my life voted for the colour currently in power, but I am merely one of tens of millions of others with a vote, many of those evidently did vote for the current government, and I have no influence on other peoples voting decisions.

[al78]

However, I wouldn't trust Edinburgh Council to run a picnic. They can find millions of £s to waste on fireworks, trams, road narrowing schemes etc. but can't afford to collect garden waste or clean the streets.

Trams are a waste of money? Traffic calming is a waste of money? Would you prefer that people had such little alternative to the car that everyone decided to drive into the city at the same time, and the roads were made as optimal as possible for motorists so they could go as fast as they liked, and to hell with vulnerable road users or anyone who doesn't own a car?

[LeithySuburbs]

However, I wouldn't trust Edinburgh Council to run a picnic. They can find millions of £s to waste on fireworks, trams, road narrowing schemes etc. but can't afford to collect garden waste or clean the streets.

Trams are a waste of money? Traffic calming is a waste of money?

Well, I was just offering my opinion but you obviously have some bee in your bonnet as you have drawn conclusions that I did not make.

I think the Edinburgh trams are a waste of money.
I said road narrowing schemes are a waste of money, not traffic calming in general. Some of the recent modifications in Edinburgh have been moronic and don't reduce speeds or congestion.

Would you prefer that people had such little alternative to the car that everyone decided to drive into the city at the same time, and the roads were made as optimal as possible for motorists so they could go as fast as they liked, and to hell with vulnerable road users or anyone who doesn't own a car?

Nice try.

[CharlesT]

I have been watching this thread with some passing interest. Living as I do in Oxfordshire I will always be a visitor to Scotland for which I have an abiding affection. In principle I would have no objection to paying a relatively modest sum as a visitor tax if it would help to maintain the amenities and facilities I use when there and help to defray some of the additional costs of the tourist industry upon those areas most affected.

I'm off to Scotland on Sunday for a short week stay and as I'm not in the mood for roughing it I've booked a hotel room. Reading this thread has prompted me to look at what might be the total tax take from my trip, not exactly but as a rough estimate, so I can gauge what impact a visitor tax might have.

Travel costs of getting there and driving around considering fuel only (diesel at 40 mpg) are about £185 of which fuel duty and VAT make up £113.

Hotel, meals and sundry other expenses will be about £680 of which VAT will be about £140. (If I was being pernickety I would deduct my home expenses from this but they would be quite small).

The upshot is that the tax component of my trip will be about £250 for 5 days, ie £50 per day. So even if a visitor tax were levied at €5 per day it would add only 10% to the tax bill and less than 3% to the overall cost. At those levels I regard it as tolerable.

Hypothecated taxes don't really work well on the whole, but while I'm relaxed at being taxed as a visitor I would like some assurance that it would go to providing support for those services and localities most affected by visitors and not be absorbed into general taxation.

[yokehead]

Sorry, still off topic initially but I had to respond, and it is about tourists!

I wonder what impact windfarms are having on tourism?
In a word - none.

I assume you've got this from reports funded by those with a vested interest in windfarms. Admittedly, it is difficult to wade past these and find another view. But here's just one from Mountaineering Scotland which, as one point, talks about displacement within Scotland i.e. folk deciding not to visit location A because of windfarms, going to location B instead. But location A loses out on that visitor's spend, which could make a substantial impact to income in that location. I am one of the visitors who will do just this, so the impact is already not 'none'.
https://www.mountaineering.scot/assets/contentfiles/media-upload/Wind_farms_and_tourism_in_Scotland_-_a_review,_Nov_2017_20171106.pdf

Further today Scotland’s biggest generator and provider of electricity in Scotland Scottish Power announced that their generation is now 100% renewable. That’s quite an achievement.

This has been answered:

It is quite an achievement, but its also a little disingenuous as it cannot supply all its customers from its current infrastructure, so it will be buying in brown energy to meet the demand. So Scottish Power customers will still be buying energy from coal and gas). Having said that. I'm not sure what the impact will be of Scottish Power's East Anglia offshore windfarm when it opens in a couple of years.

Scottish power will always need to buy power from non-renewable sources when the wind doesn't blow and streams are low. Also ironic that Scottish Power will have windfarms off East Anglia!

The greatest recent impact upon services and infrastructure across the UK has been the vast immigration in recent years.

That is simply not the case. In 1921 Scotland’s population stood at 4.88 million. By 2017 it had increased to 5.42 million. With BREXIT there is a fear that Scotland’s population could go into decline. We need more immigration not less.

My comment was the UK as a whole. However by going back to 1921 you have ignored the population decrease particular to Scotland post 1921, through emigration. Population in Scotland has increased 7% in the past 20 years, similar to Wales at 8%. Below England's 14% but many regions in England are lower than that average. It is down to opportunities for folk and clearly there are challenges in many regions across the whole of the UK.

Which leads nicely back to topic, sort of. To me it is no surprise that it is Edinburgh leading the call for a tourist tax since the city and surrounding areas appear to have the fastest population growth in Scotland. Edinburgh's population has apparently grown by 12% in the past 10 years.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/migrants-push-edinburgh-past-half-a-million-qwfl7v8hz

This states an estimated population rise in the region:
https://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/business/new-figures-suggest-edinburgh-s-population-set-to-rise-rapidly-1-4767549

"The number of households in Midlothian is projected to rise by 36 per cent by 2041, while Edinburgh and East Lothian will increase by 26 per cent and West Lothian by 21 per cent compared with the all-Scotland figure of just 13 per cent"

"A West Lothian Council spokesman said the new figures showed that over the next few decades demand for services was going to drastically increase......Scottish Government funding is insufficient to meet the growth we’re experiencing and increasing costs. West Lothian Council currently faces a budget gap of £65 million over the next five years and we have developed a plan to bridge that gap".

So an easy method to start bridging that gap is to introduce a 'tourist tax', but this will simply be absorbed into the council's overall income. I already pay substantial taxes within my spend in visiting parts of the UK, let alone the taxes where I live and to central government. Paying additional tax, labelled as 'tourist tax', in any part of the UK is yet another back-door tax.

[Moriarty]

I assume you've got this from reports funded by those with a vested interest in windfarms. Admittedly, it is difficult to wade past these and find another view. But here's just one from Mountaineering Scotland

I probably responded to an MS questionnaire used in the preparation of that research.....in essence you flag research that doesn't find a tourist impact as "vested interest" by pointing towards research with a major vested interest.

MS membership, like me, tend to resent the visual impact of wind turbines more than almost any other section of society.

Paying additional tax, labelled as 'tourist tax', in any part of the UK is yet another back-door tax.

I'm confused by the tax house - which taxes come in the front door, which use the back door and which use the tradesmans' entrance?

I have no issue with a visitor tax, particularly if it is ploughed into infrastructure that is under pressure from visitors. I seriously doubt a couple of quid will be a deal-breaker for most tourists, it pales into insignificance when put alongside fuel and accommodation costs involved in regular travel to the Highlands......perhaps I won't upgrade to piri-piri fries.

[Backpacker]

I don't think it's a bad idea.

We went the Slovenia back in March and had to pay a "Tourist Tax" which (I think) was €1.50 per person per night (€24 for the duration of our stay). I'm pretty sure that money stays with the local authority to be used on local infrastructure.

[Sunset tripper]

I don't think it's a bad idea.

We went the Slovenia back in March and had to pay a "Tourist Tax" which (I think) was €1.50 per person per night (€24 for the duration of our stay). I'm pretty sure that money stays with the local authority to be used on local infrastructure.

That's fair enough backpacker but the VAT in Slovenia and many other European countries is slashed on hotel bills so instead of paying 20% VAT you are only paying 10%
Why can't we divert some of that 10% instead of adding on more and more different taxes with associated running costs.
Charles T has worked out he is going to pay around £250 in tax for his visit to Scotland and a visitor from abroad will pay a fair whack too. Hard to believe Charles Ts visit to scotland is going to cost us £250 in damage or services. You would think it wouldn't be too difficult to transfer some of this money to local infrastructure.
I understand your and many others view that it is only a few quid, the price of a beer or a bag of chips and its one of the reasons it will probably be approved.
Also a big percentage of the tourist tax will go on collection and admin.

If the accommodation VAT was cut to 17.5% and a 2.5% tourist tax added it would be far fairer but you would still as a tourist be paying far more tax than you are in Slovenia.

[Gareth Harper]

I use my democratic vote, and have never in my life voted for the colour currently in power, but I am merely one of tens of millions of others with a vote, many of those evidently did vote for the current government, and I have no influence on other peoples voting decisions.

Al87 voting is just one aspect of democracy.

So this is an extra visitor paying several £100s in tax already. I don't know how many extra visitors we have each year but they are all paying £100s in tax that we would not have if there were no extra visitors.
So where is all the extra tax revenue going from all these extra visitors that are such a burden on our services.

The answer is not to tax these visitors even more but to direct the hard earned cash these visitors pay in tax to give them decent roads and toilets etc. etc. etc. because they are paying for it already...................

Sunset Tripper, it’s pretty obvious. We are paying more tax to compensate for the massive shortfall in corporation tax and other tax dodges. Estimates of the UK tax gap (the difference between what should be collected and what actually is collected) vary from HMRC’s £36 billion pa (does not include tax losses caused by multinationals) to tax campaigners Richard Murphy’s estimate of £119 billion pounds. To put these figures in perspective Scotland’s NHS budget for 2015/6 was 12.2 billion. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/oct/20/experts-dismiss-hmrcs-shrinking-tax-gap-estimate

So, whilst I personally don’t object to a tourist tax in the short term – ie a tax that is collected, placed in a specific account and can only be spent on local tourist related infrastructure and facilities – really in the longer term there should be no need. That councils across Scotland are closing public toilets is just a sick joke. It’s idiotic.
The simple fact is that we are getting fleeced, and the impression I get is the general public seems fairly relaxed about it.

I assume you've got this from reports funded by those with a vested interest in windfarms.

No. Yokehead visitor figures are up right across Scotland. One or two people avoiding one or two areas isn’t an issue. We require electricity and at the end of the day it has to become near 100% renewable.

The greatest recent impact upon services and infrastructure across the UK has been the vast immigration in recent years.

That is simply not the case. In 1921 Scotland’s population stood at 4.88 million. By 2017 it had increased to 5.42 million. With BREXIT there is a fear that Scotland’s population could go into decline. We need more immigration not less.


My comment was the UK as a whole.

I think you are on the wrong forum for discussions on immigration to England.

[Moriarty]

Also a big percentage of the tourist tax will go on collection and admin.

A speculative statement, or is there an authoritative source for this? What percentage?

I have no specialist knowledge in this field - but a blanket tariff without means testing looks superficially like a means of revenue raising without high overhead costs.

[Sunset tripper]

Also a big percentage of the tourist tax will go on collection and admin.

A speculative statement, or is there an authoritative source for this? What percentage?

I have no specialist knowledge in this field - but a blanket tariff without means testing looks superficially like a means of revenue raising without high overhead costs.

Yes speculative maybe and I'm no expert in the field either. I read a document quoting 15% in admin and collection costs. Will have a look for it again.

Even if it's smaller, it's another tax to admin and collect when we are already hammering the visitor already.

I get your other point about spending a fortune anyway so what's another couple of quid a night. But lets think about it, you've got your gear, your food and drink, your car maintenance costs, your petrol, your £9 A day parking charge and now add on your £2 A night tourist tax which is only going to increase. What next? Where does it all end?

[jupe1407]

Admin costs always skyrocket when means-testing is brought into the equation. I wouldn't expect particularly high admin costs for an across the board tax tbh. If one has to be introduced I think it should be left to the local authorities to decide (if indeed they can do so without making a massive arse of it - this would probably rule out Angus )

[yokehead]

I probably responded to an MS questionnaire used in the preparation of that research.....in essence you flag research that doesn't find a tourist impact as "vested interest" by pointing towards research with a major vested interest.

MS membership, like me, tend to resent the visual impact of wind turbines more than almost any other section of society.

Fair point. Key was to demonstrate to the poster that there are other views than that there is no impact. However, your comment on MS membership has prompted me that perhaps I should join MS (already a BMC member). If I do, would you be eligible for a referral fee?

I'm confused by the tax house - which taxes come in the front door, which use the back door and which use the tradesmans' entrance?

Ye gods, is there a tradesman's entrance too?!

[Skyelines]

I'm confused by the tax house - which taxes come in the front door, which use the back door and which use the tradesmans' entrance?

I would suggest an example of a back door tax involves VAT on petrol and diesel fuel.

VAT is supposed to be a tax on the value of goods and services provided. If you buy a pair of boots costing £100 to supply you pay £120 ie. the £20 VAT is clearly seen and understood, in the front door.

However it is not so straightforward with the fuel you put in your car.

The price of it is made up of the cost of the supply at the pump, the fuel duty (tax) and VAT. The VAT is levied on the combined figure of the supply and the duty.
In other words we pay a portion of the VAT as a tax on a tax and not on the cost of supply of the goods.

eg. If the cost at the pump is £1.35 the breakdown is: cost of supply 54.55p, Duty 57.95p VAT 22.50p

or if you like 10.91p VAT on the supply in the front door and 11.59p on the duty in the back door.