More than £25 million has been raised by Devon’s councils through double-charging council tax on holiday homes, but some of those forking out the extra cash brand it “totally unjust”.

Supporters of the policy of double-charging council tax claim the extra money helps make local services more sustainable because high pressure is put on roads and refuse collections during the tourist season, etc.

The seemingly lower number of permanent residents because of holiday homes also means there are fewer people to pay for the upkeep of those services, according to those in favour of the tax.

But Steve and Sue Toone, who have owned their second home in Aveton Gifford for 22 years, have blasted the policy as “totally unjust”, noting they have always paid council tax on their Devon property – it just used to have a 25 per cent discount but now is double.

“It’s completely unfair,” Mr Toone, who lives in Derbyshire, said.

“It was purported to be about housing, but that is nonsense as none of this money is going towards housing.”

Mr Toone, who is the chair of his local parish council, Bretby, said he and his wife spend a week each month in their second home, and upkeep over the years means they have “spent thousands” employing local tradespeople.

But the double council tax hit has influenced how they spend locally.

“We haven’t got the money that we used to spend when we were down here,” Mrs Toone added. “We’ve spent tens of thousands of pounds doing it up with local tradespeople, but we can’t afford that any more, and it also impacts how much we use local restaurants.”

Mr Toone added that the pair had “decreed to spend as little as possible” while down in South Devon, bringing everything they needed with them.

“We know it’s unfair on shop owners, etc, but we have made a pact that we won’t buy things down here unless it’s an emergency,” he said.

Curiously, the county council is not directly responsible for housing, which leads critics of the second-homes premium to believe little, if any, of the cash helps with housing needs.

Councillor Julian Brazil had urged the Conservative county council that introduced the scheme to ring-fence the second-homes premium cash to support housing projects, but now that he leads the council, he has been unable to fulfil that desire.

“Before I got into power, I was keen to invest this money into housing as it was a once-in-a-lifetime windfall, but then the government withdrew our rural services delivery grant, which about exactly matches the second homes council tax income,” he said.

South Hams District Council and West Devon District Council have both pledged to spend the income on housing initiatives.

“The suggestion when the policy was launched is that it would bring house prices down, but even with something like a 5 per cent drop in Salcombe, that doesn’t make it affordable for local people,” Mrs Toone said.

“There are nine properties in this development, and four of them are holiday homes,” Mr Toone added.

“All of them feel the same as I do, and all of them have been here for 20-odd years; there needs to be some compromise, as I don’t see why we should pay extra for services we’re not using full-time.”