Clause 75 - Occupier's loss payment
Planning and Compulsory Purchase Bill
2:45 pm
Mrs Barbara Roche (Minister of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Hornsey and Wood Green, Labour)
Clearly we will want to keep this point under review and will update provision when necessary. The hon. Gentleman questioned the figure of 2.5 per cent. for the occupier's loss payment. That derives from the current home loss payment, under which owner-occupiers can claim 10 per cent. of the value of the interest that is being acquired. It complements the 7.5 per cent. payable as a basic loss payment on a ratio of 1:3 to give owner-occupiers a freehold interest in non-residential property, and makes a total loss payment of 10 per cent. of the value of their interest. It is based on the current home loss payment regime, which most people agree should stay as it is. It also seems right on the basis of fairness and equity.
Subsection (8) of new section 33B specifies that the basis for calculating the land amount is to be £100 per hectare for the first 100 hectares taken, and £50 per hectare for the next 300 hectares or part of a hectare, bringing the maximum payable to £25,000. As the occupier's loss payment is intended to compensate occupiers for the compulsory nature of the acquisition and the inconvenience of having to move at a time not of their choosing, the land amount is intended to provide a fair balance in the amount payable between freeholders and protected and other tenancies, which are of value, and farm business tenancies, which are not. It ignores differences in the values of different types of agricultural land, because the additional payment is intended to relate to the distress and inconvenience of being obliged to relocate farming operations rather than the intrinsic productive value of the land.