Clause 5
Business Rate Supplements Bill
12:45 pm
Brian Binley (Northampton South, Conservative)
I am also concerned about this matter. I have already drawn attention to what I consider to be the weakness in the ability of local authorities to consult properly. Part of that weakness lies not only in the document produced for consultation but in the ability to make people aware of such documents. That affects the entire prospectus issue. Will the Minister consider ways to notify the public of what is going on in the first place, so that they can visit sites where the prospectus might be available? Will he also consider increasing the number of those sites? In rural areas, in particular, finding out about such matters in the first place is a serious problem, not to mention getting to the place where the information can be obtained. In particular, some elderly business people might not be quite up to using the internet in ways that we might expect.