Bore da to: Cllr Dyfrig Siencyn, Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas, Mark Drakeford, Dilwyn Williams, Julie James, Liz Saville-Roberts,

I started a petition a few days ago “Stop £10k grant to "pseudo" business second home owners in Gwynedd that have flipped to BR” see https://www.change.org/p/gwynedd-county-council-stop-10k-grant-to-pseudo-business-second-home-owners-in-gwynedd-that-have-flipped-to-br

This whole business rate flipping was warned about at least 2 years ago – even Mark Drakeford was aware of it when he was Finance Minister for the WA – I have correspondence and that it would be exploited. A rational well thought out alternative was proposed but both this propose and the warnings were ignored!

I have seen the criteria (thanks), but I do hope that this time there will be proper scrutiny and that “pseudo” businesses are identified, penalised and money lost recovered. That this money is ring-fenced and put towards social/affordable housing for locals. I also hope that the FOI that I requested will be answered by the deadline, with proper answers this time.

We are already up to 1,415 signatures, so I think that justifies some action from all of you. I realise that you are probably at home isolating – as we are, so plenty of time on you’re hands!!

As you know a lot of businesses are/have being decimated by this lock down, which is for the health of Wales and is totally correct and understood.

But I like many other businesses am still awaiting receipt of this grant. Thank you UK government, but why is Wales sitting on it? I am grateful for the grant, but as we are refunding guests that have booked and now have to cancel; as this is morally correct even though it will eat into my savings; so when and if this grant arrives if will not even cover these refunds. Plus we still have big overheads, insurance, council tax, electricity, gas, oil, water, maintenance, etc etc etc… with zero income – we are not second homes so this is our primary income.

Interesting that someone chose the lower band amount of £12k rather than £10k for the grant and that you will pay out to all businesses in this category including those receiving 100% relief being below £6k - £12k in England -  so have never contributed to the community!! The higher banding of £12,001 - £51,000 is also an interesting band.

I and many other businesses have yet to be told officially that BR have been scrapped for this year 2020 from the Council. Also in 2018/19 there was transitional relief for businesses between £6k-£12k – I see that this has been scrapped for 2020-21 and the multiplier increase as well, with no warning!!!

The traditional self-catering industry has already been decimated by AirBnB and the OTA’s which only own software and do not pay any tax, the Static Parks like Haulfryn et al allowing statics to be rented out not contributing to the local community at all. Why you have let this happen is yet another question that needs to be explored.

This coupled with the damaging GCC decision to raise tax to 150% on second homes thereby encouraging “morally dishonest homeowners” to use a loophole; pointed out to you at least a year earlier; giving people the ability to flip to business rates without real due diligence from anyone the VOA or GCC (I do have examples!).

Unfortunately the traditional self-catering holiday cottages businesses, which were encouraged years ago to diversify into this field, are being penalised for their massive investment with this not fit for purpose business rates and council tax. These are the very businesses that do contribute to the community using local labour, local food suppliers and promoting the best of Wales, so why not support them rather than second home and static owners?

I hate to think what this will do to other businesses such as garden centres, restaurants, pubs, jobs in the hospitality business, gardening, cleaning, transport, coffee shops, etc. I would really like to know what if anything you are collectively or singly doing to stop this injustice. Specifically what if anything you will be implementing in respect of the not fit for purpose Business Rate tax - to make it a level playing field for legitimate businesses like ours?

I would really appreciate an answer, rather than the traditional buck passing that seems to occur in politics.

On a secondary item we are really looking forward to fast broadband for our children for home schooling by the 4th May 2020 as promised on the news! I am not sure how you can achieve this in 2 weeks, when a lot of rural business struggle to get 5Mbps broadband and no or very poor 3G let alone 4G. We as a business have been trying to get “superfast cymru” for over 3-4 years! Another squandering of tax payers money to Open Reach (a monopoly) and sub-contractors. This is especially the case of the fibre between Llanbedrog and Rhyd-y-clafdy which was not installed correctly and no-one will accept responsibility (BT blame Open Reach (a BT company) who blame BT and sub- contractors -  more buck passing) yet I suspect someone has been paid, this is a disgrace in itself. It is also the area in which I live between!!

Many, many thanks – I look forward to an early response.

Kind Regards,

Alan