Scotland’s tenants’ union is calling on the city council to spend tourist tax revenue on affordable housing

LIVING Rent, Scotland’s tenants’ union, has called on Edinburgh City Council to spend profits from the proposed tourist tax on affordable housing.

A public consultation on the tourist tax is currently underway and is due to end on Sunday. The city council is asking residents of the capital for their feedback on the regulation.

Living Rent then intervened and urged residents to tell the council that the profits should be spent on affordable housing for locals.

The union has even gone so far as to create a document outlining its arguments for residents to use and present to the council.

The council’s consultation will ask residents to put forward ideas on how they should spend the profits. Living Rent calls for a significant increase in housing spending.

The levy is estimated to raise £50 million a year by taxing visitors on their spending in the capital.

The council has already agreed to spend some of the money raised through the visitor levy on council housing after lobbying by Living Rent.

But the union said this did not go far enough, pointing to statistics showing 5,123 families were housed in temporary accommodation and 23,000 people were waiting for permanent social housing.

The union’s pre-written response, prepared for residents, calls on the council to increase the night tax from 5% to 8%, to significantly increase spending on housing, to commit to ensuring that most Buildings are social housing and provide money for other public infrastructure.

They are also calling on residents to support their response to the consultation with signatures, representing 297 votes so far.

Living Rent said: “The unbridled growth of tourism over the last few decades has exacerbated Edinburgh’s housing crisis.

“Developers and landlords have taken full advantage of tourism to hollow out our homes and communities in the name of increasing profits.

“As a result, members in Edinburgh have come together to urge the council to spend the money raised from the tourist tax on council housing. And we won.

“The council must allocate £5 million a year from the visitor levy to borrow a further £150 million to build new council and affordable homes.

“But we don’t think that goes far enough.”