Beach hut owners hit back at council over 'second home' tax plan

Beach hut owners say they are looking into the legal basis of plans to reclassify their huts as second homes for the purposes of council tax.

More than 300 owners will have to pay full council tax from April on huts at Mudeford Spit in Dorset, if plans by Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP) Council are agreed.

Mudeford Sandbanks Beach Hut Association (MSBHA) said the second home rule was being applied to "a wooden shed with no mains connections or individual toilet facilities".

BCP Council said it was "looking at every nook and cranny" as it attempted to tackle a £9m budget shortfall.

The 344 huts on the sandbank near Christchurch can only be used overnight for part of the year but can sell for hundreds of thousands of pounds.

The 2026/27 council tax is expected to be set in February but, based on the 2025/26 charge for band A properties, bills for the huts would increase from £618 to £1,236 a year.

MSBHA chair Darren Pridwell said owners had already seen their annual fees "almost treble to over £5,200" as the council sought to harmonise charges along the coast.

He said: "Mudeford hut owners may have a degree of sympathy for these increased costs if the level of services were at an acceptable level, but there has been next to no investment in facilities in the recent past and these are now desperately needed.

"It feels like this is all take and no give."

Beach hut owner Gemma Paterson said her family, who had owned their hut for three generations, already had to rent out their hut to afford the ground rent and existing council tax payments.

"Most people think all the beach hut owners are rolling in money, this is not the case, especially for myself and my family," she said.

"We don't have running water and we haven't seen any improvement in the facilities over 20 years.

"How can they justify increasing the council tax when we can only stay in them for 8 months of the year?"

The council hopes the change will raise about £211,000.

BCP finance councillor Mike Cox said: "It is a small amount, but we have to pull every lever we've got and this is just one of them."

The proposal will be discussed by cabinet on 14 January.