Clause 18
Finance (No. 2) Bill
1:45 pm
Philip Dunne (Ludlow, Conservative)
I do not profess to having any specific expert knowledge. I receive rather too many e-mails from art auctioneers for reasons that I cannot really understand, but they make me aware when sales are coming up. They have sales at times of the year when there are many visitors to London—London being the centre of the art market in Europe and a world centre—and they tend to be in June and July, months when other occasions, such as major sporting events, draw people to this country. The other popular seasons tend to be in the pre-Christmas period—in November and December—which again may be partly related to the fact that people enjoy buying Christmas presents at that time of year. There are well established seasons and because of the lead time for drawing up the necessary publications to make the market work properly, the provision cannot be introduced overnight without having significant repercussions on the normal working of the market. For that reason, I support the amendment.