Landlords aggrieved by the government’s changes tax reforms have suggested a coordinated campaign of putting rents up.
It follows a High Court decision earlier this month which saw a judicial review against the changes thrown out by a judge.
The changes will restrict landlords’ ability to deduct mortgage interest from their rental income to 20 per cent.
But Mr Justice Dingemans said the government had discretion in tax matters “for good constitutional reasons” and that the changes raised political and economic questions, but not legal ones.
Responding to the result, the Axe the Tenant Tax campaign said it was disappointed by the decision and asked for its members’ opinions about what it should do now.
It said: “Many people have written to us saying that the judicial review decision was the trigger they were waiting for before putting up rents substantially or selling up.
“Others have suggested a fixed date that we advertise publicly and to our tenants, before we write to them all (and the press and Shelter and Generation Rent) telling them that Section 24 is the reason that their rents are going up.”
The campaign also said landlords should write to their local MPs about the issue.
The landlords’ case was that the changes handed an economic advantage to corporate landlords – their “direct competitors” – which amounted to state aid.
But HM Revenue & Customs said there was “no equivalence” between the tax treatment of individual landlords, corporate landlords and holiday home owners.
