4 May 2023
On 2 May 2023, the Mobile Homes (Pitch Fees) Act received Royal Assent.
The Act:
- changes the inflationary index for annual pitch fee reviews from RPI to CPI;
- applies CPI to all pitch fee reviews where the pitch fee review notice is served on or after the day that the Act comes into force two months after Royal Assent (2 July 2023); and
- applies to England and Wales
A mobile (park) home owner (resident) pays the site owner a pitch fee for the right to occupy a pitch on the site. The Mobile Homes Act 1983 defines the costs that may be included in the pitch fee. Pitch fees can be reviewed annually. This allows site owners to recover increases in the costs within the pitch fee due to inflation.
From April 2011 the Government adopted CPI as the inflation rate for the indexation of benefits, tax credits and public service pensions as a more appropriate measure which was consistent with the measure of inflation used by the Bank of England. In 2013, the designation of RPI as a national statistic was cancelled by the UK Statistics Authority. As the RPI rate is generally higher than CPI, mobile home owners, the majority of whom are elderly, became increasingly concerned that their incomes which generally increase by CPI, would not keep pace with the rise in the pitch fees.
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