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The UK already has the highest property taxation of any developed country in the world – yes, in the world. That’s according to the OECD, and those taxes raise more than £100bn a year, or 3.7 per cent of GDP. So why is Rachel Reeves looking at ways of increasing property taxes even further, and would that clobber the housing market if she were to do so?

We don’t know what she will decide, but we do know that she has asked the Treasury to look into ways of replacing stamp duty land tax with a property levy on owner-occupied homes worth more than £500,000 – a “mansion tax”.

In addition, she reportedly also wants to reform council tax and replace it with a local property tax, though given its complexity, this seems to be a project for a second term of a Labour government, not this one.

There’s an obvious problem with stamp duty as it exists now, in that it deters people from moving, and there is an obvious problem with council tax, which is still based on 1991 values. But quite how she might reform either is an economic and political minefield.

Start with stamp duty. Back in 2011, the Mirrlees Review, carried out by the Institute for Fiscal Studies, set out what a good tax system for a developed country might look like, and how UK taxation might be changed to reflect this.

It was led by the Scottish Nobel Laureate James Mirrlees and is still the best handbook showing the........

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