Thank you for raising this, and thank you also for your interest in the issue and for speaking to my officials with your ideas as to how we can start to address this particular matter. It is the case that a business must be able to demonstrate that the property that they're seeking to let as holiday let accommodation, for example, is available for at least 140 days in a 12-month period, and actually let for 70 days. Now, the question there is: have we got the balance right? Is 140 days to be shown as available for letting right, and is 70 days for actually being let—is that right? Does that demonstrate that that property is being used as self-catering accommodation? So, this is another issue that I'll be speaking to the local government finance sub-group about at our next meeting, which I believe is next week, but it's an issue that I'm certainly alive to.

We did ask local authorities to let us know of any cases where they felt that a property was being marketed as self-catering accommodation, but actually not being used in that way. Local authorities did come forward, including Gwynedd, with some examples of properties that they thought fell into that category. The Valuation Office Agency looked at each of the cases and found that they were all were operating within the law, but then there is that question as to whether or not we have it right in terms of the number of days, and I'm certainly keen to look at that.