Editor

Gorau i Gymru has recently set up an online petition to the Welsh Government entitled, ‘Ensure owners of second homes and holiday lets in Wales register to vote only at their primary address in devolved and local elections’.

The so-called Best for Wales group should perhaps remember that in 1761 Welsh and other second-home owners in America resented that they should be taxed by a British Parliament to which they elected no representatives. Their slogan was “Taxation without representation is a tyranny”!

The Electoral Commission has confirmed that: “People who are registered at two addresses are entitled to vote in local government elections at each of those addresses, provided they are not in the same local government area.” Although having a democratic right to do so, I suggest most British second-home owners would be happy to forego their right to vote in local elections in Wales if they were exempt from the 150 per cent council tax that is currently payable in most areas. A far cry from the 90 per cent council tax payment that used to be the government guideline for second homes!

Owners of second homes and holiday lets in Wales should register to vote in the 2021 local council elections to ensure they have a say in who represents them and what their inflated council tax is to be spent on. No taxation without representation!

John Rees Moss Bala

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