Clause 43 - Arrangements with respect to business improvement districts
Local Government Bill
11:15 am
Mrs Valerie Davey (Bristol West, Labour)
The hon. Gentleman says ''or fall.'' That would mean a failed business improvement district. I make my points as someone who supports the overall thrust of Government policy on the issue. I support business improvement districts; there is a great deal of evidence to suggest that they will be successful in improving areas in our town centres and cities. I am trying to help Government policy through our amendments.
The economic reason for property owners to be included is that they will see the rental value on their property increase. They stand to benefit significantly as a result. Therefore, it seems odd that the Government will not ask property owners to contribute. The business reason that I have sketched out slightly is that representatives of property owners are encouraging the Government to include them in the Bill. However, it is not only the British Property
Federation that is doing so: a range of organisations that represent different forms of business and owners of different types of property have helped to draft our amendments. They have argued their case before the Select Committee and, I understand, in private to the Government. Business is very much behind our amendments.
I make the political case briefly to Labour colleagues that it would be odd to exclude property owners. However, they should be encouraged that those same property owners want to be included in the Bill so that they can pay their fair share.
I mainly want to talk about the bureaucratic issue, with the help of the notes from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. Many arguments are being put to Ministers to reject the involvement of property owners. Some of those are practical and some are theoretical. Those arguments should be exposed and dealt with in Committee. It is important that the Under-Secretary and his colleagues think about that. I know from talking to councillors up and down the country that when they face a policy issue on their local authority they often—understandably—rely heavily on the advice of officials. Officers of the council, like civil servants, provide that information. However, that information must be questioned and those arguments tested.
The Ministers in the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister have been exceedingly busy in recent weeks and months. We understand how busy they have been. My suggestion—in the nicest possible way—is that perhaps they have not really had the chance to test the arguments that they have been given in private. Were those arguments tested fully, they would find that they quickly collapse.
The first argument that has been put to Ministers is that the property tax system in the UK is very different from that in the United States. In the United States, property tax is paid by the property owners, whereas the statutory framework in case law in the UK means that the liability for property tax falls on the tenants or the occupiers of a property. That is a core difference that one cannot dispute. The question is whether the Committee should seek to create in the legislation a UK version of the BID system in order to include property owners. I do not think that the difference per se between the UK and the United States should mean that we do not include them.
To return to the officials' concerns, they have apparently told Ministers that to include property owners would require a fundamental shift in the primary legislation that affects uniform business rates, so there is no way that they can be included.
It being twenty-five minutes past Eleven o'clock, The Chairman adjourned the Committee without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.
Adjourned till this day at half-past Two o'clock.