Do you want your empty house to be taxed?

Are people noticing that in most of the recent articles or reports about the referendum as proposed by Alternattiva Demokratika the obvious and agreed need to reform the rent laws is followed by their asserted need to tax vacant property? Are those who are signing up for this referendum aware of this?

AD's spokesman on economic affairs wrote as much in The Sunday Times recently. He wrote that "Another source of income is that from the taxation on vacant property. It is indeed reasonable once our rent laws have been liberalised and property owners given back their real estate... to levy a tax on those properties that are capriciously being left vacant for years on end".

I am very sure that both owners of vacant property as well as those who have had to put up with tenants staying in their home for a pittance for years on end would be horrified at this proposal from the pro-referendum party to tax vacant property.

Why is one political party not sticking to one simple and honest message while attempting to drum up support to do away with the old rent laws. The message should simply be this, particularly with regard to residential leases. The right of inheritance in private leases is totally wrong and must be phased out. Why are they persisting in making more and more outrageous promises, which they say will result if these rent laws are made to somehow disappear? They should be confident enough of getting support for a referendum just on that issue and not persist in making illogical and wild promises that cannot be borne out.

First they said getting rid of the old rent laws would boost the rental market. Why? Those properties that are empty in Malta today can be rented out by landlords with peace of mind, at least relatively, as the old rent laws have no bearing on any lets post-1995.

Then they said changing the rent laws would produce more affordable housing or even bring down prices. Again I can't see why when 25 per cent of empty properties have not brought about this change! Prices may start to level off soon, particularly if first-time buyers cannot reach the current price levels or at least not enough of them, but since the majority of engaged couples are still buying three-bed flats, there is still scope for some more downsizing of expectations. The Malta Environment and Planning Authority is also issuing permits for many more units than needed in relation to the number of new households being formed. So, again, why isn't oversupply dampening prices as of now?

There is another assertion from the pro-referendum camp I find baffling. How are all these empty properties which are apparently going to come into the supply chain going to be used? If there are basically too many homes in Malta in comparison with the number of Maltese people and families, who is going to fill up this surplus of 25 per cent of our housing?

Unless every marriage breaks down, or every single person leaves mum and dad's nest at 18 to live on his or her own, who exactly is going to fill up these empty properties anyway? It is clear they cannot be filled because we have an oversupply (albeit of the wrong type of units in the wrong areas).

This was made even clearer when AD visited Gozo and talked about the empty properties there. Now let's be realistic. Both the north of Malta (Mellieha and its environs to you and me) and Gozo have a huge number of empty units. But you don't need to be a housing specialist or an economic spokesman to know why. Empty houses in these areas most particularly have absolutely nothing to do with the old rent laws and everything to do with the Maltese buying summer houses and buying properties as investments and changing the rent laws will have absolutely no bearing on empty units there, whatever the claims being made.

One of AD's spokesmen last week made another outrageous claim in The Times. After claiming that the government will need money to finance what the private sector is effectively financing today by providing cheap housing, he wrote that the government can generate necessary funds in a number of ways, adding that "The first source is from savings from capital outlays that will be made when the Housing Authority will no longer need to build properties because it can access vacant properties in the marketplace".

This is the second time I have had to comment on how badly prepared some AD spokesmen are on the Housing Authority's work and how it is financed. We are practically totally self-financing (in terms of cash) and obtain mainly Church land and from that land we generate profits which allow us to build and sell housing at a subsidised price as well as to provide all our other services from rent rebates to repair grants, from lifts to housing for rent and urban renewal.

So no savings will be made. And even if we do start to access private units instead of building our own does Edward Fenech imagine that the private sector will sell them to us cheaply just because we want them? It will cost us even more than it is costing us now, which means ultimately a burden on the taxpayer and no one else.

Amid the cacophony of wild claims and hyperbole I intend to go on saying the truth. The right of inheritance must go and properties slowly returned to their owners. This is an issue of justice. It is not however a win-win situation as AD are trying to say! The only way to provide more affordable housing is through more investment in housing. The longer we put it off, the more expensive it is going to be. Changing rent laws will not and cannot provide housing cheaply for Malta and Gozo's low-income families and politicians should stop making promises that cannot be kept!

Ms Micallef is chairman of the Housing Authority.