Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, how many properties are unoccupied in Dorset; and for how long on average a property has been left unoccupied in that county in the period for which such information has been collated.

For the purposes of council tax base, we collect data on an annual basis on the total number of dwellings classed as empty. We also collect data on the number of dwellings classed as empty and being charged the Empty Homes Premium, and the number of dwellings classed as empty and have been for more than 6 months.

Local authority level data as at 2 October 2017 can be found at the following link https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/council-taxbase-2017-in-england.

The number of long-term vacant dwellings across England remains lower than when records began.