The National Landlords Association is to donate £10,000 to support the judicial review against the Government’s controversial decision to cap the ability of landlords to set finance costs against tax.

The donation is being made even though the NLA does not think the action will succeed,

NLA CEO Richard Lambert made the announcement at the Tenant Tax Summit yesterday at Earls Court, London, where speakers against the measure included Lord Howard Flight, ex-boxer Kriss Akabusi, and Richard Dyson, personal finance editor at the Daily Telegraph.

The change in landlords’ tax regime – announced in last year’s Summer Budget – will be introduced in 2017 as part of the Finance Act and will restrict the rate of mortgage relief to the basic rate of income tax (20%) for all landlords regardless of their personal tax bracket.

The measure has been widely criticised and a crowd funded judicial review was launched by landlords Chris Cooper and Steve Bolton.

Until now the NLA had chosen not to donate to the campaign on the basis that it does not believe the judicial review will be successful. Addressing the conference, Lambert said: “We have yet to see an argument which would convince us to change our mind about the judicial review’s chances of success, but we have to recognise that there is always the possibility that we may be wrong.

“For all the humble pie I would have to eat, I for one would be quite happy to be proved wrong on this one, so as a goodwill gesture to the campaign in recognition of our shared aim of fighting for landlords, the NLA will donate £10,000 to the campaign fund.

“The NLA is committed to continued lobbying to achieve a political solution to the problem presented by this disastrous government policy and we are hopeful of a positive outcome for the hundreds of thousands of landlords whose businesses are currently in jeopardy.”