Farm Shops

Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Environment – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 8 May 1991.

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Photo of Robert Key Robert Key , Salisbury 12:00, 8 May 1991

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving me the opportunity to congratulate her electors on a sensible decision last Thursday. My hon. Friend is absolutely right; we wish to see the market operating on, perhaps, a level turnip field. Of course, farmers pay rates not only on farm shops but on agricultural buildings used for the storage of fruit and vegetables grown elsewhere, or for the storage of intervention board surplus grain or skimmed milk. Where produce is sold at the farm gate, the local Inland Revenue valuation officer may make an assessment for rates. A permanent stall situated at the entrance to a farm, used on a regular basis for the sale of farm produce, might be regarded as rateable.