Implicit Land Taxation and Affordable Housing Provision in England

The paper considers the proposal in England that a continuing requirement for residential developers to contribute directly to the supply of affordable housing in return for planning permission should operate alongside a new tax on land value increases due to planning permission. The paper asks whether it is right in principle for affordable housing to be supported by the implicit taxation of development. It is argued that in terms of transparency, clarity, and certainty explicit taxation is to be preferred to implicit taxation. It is thus suggested that once the new explicit tax is in place developers should no longer be routinely required to pay an additional implicit affordable housing tax. Affordable housing should, it is argued, be supported on the basis of need, not the resources available from the development process. The link between the provision of affordable housing and planning obligations should be broken.