Non-Domestic Rating (Nursery Grounds) Bill — House of Lords, 2018-07-24
Topic: Agriculture
Nicholas Bourne (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, first let me say that I have lost a bet: I said that there was nothing more certain than that the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, would put down an amendment. I owe my team and I probably owe the noble Lord a beer as well. I thank him very much for his support I shall deal with the points raised by noble Lords, whom I thank very much for their participation in this debate. I turn first to the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, and his point about the provenance of the decision that led to the Court of Appeal judgment in Tunnel Tech Ltd v Reeves We have the separation of powers in this country, and HMRC is not a government department, so the decision in this case cannot be laid at the feet of the Government. It would have been entirely wrong for us to interfere—and it would have been interference—in a wholly unconstitutional way with the valuation office procedures, the valuation tribunal decision and the Court of Appeal decision That said, once the decision was made, we faced having to decide whether we should seek to overturn the judgment or should let it stand. I think it took everybody by surprise—everybody in the agricultural sector, surveyors. The great mass of people were caught on the hop by this decision, and that certainly included the Government; we were not expecting the decision. However, faced with letting it go through and doing something, I think we have taken the right decision, as borne out by noble Lords’ contributions in deciding to reverse it. The alternative would have been unthinkable for our agricultural industry, and I share what other noble Lords have said about the importance of the agricultural industry and returning some certainty to it. In a way, as other noble Lords will have realised, there is a parallel with the recent legislation on the staircase tax that we have been looking at. In that case, once again, we were confronted with a decision that we did not expect. That is important Let me correct a particular point that I made when I said that HMRC is not a government department. It is a government department, but it is a non-ministerial department. I should have stressed that, and it is important that I correct myself on that point My noble friend Lady Byford speaks with great knowledge and authority in this area, particularly in relation to her home county of Leicestershire and her experience there. She asked a very valid question: how is it that some have been affected by this judgment and not others? All are affected by this judgment, but so far the valuation has been done only for some. We are therefore moving fairly quickly, because valuations here apply to just a handful of cases involving the reimbursement of backdated money—the retrospective effect. If we did not act, more and more agricultural businesses would gradually be involved I join my noble friend and the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, in thanking the NFU and the FUW very much for their help, their briefing and their great interest and assistance in this case I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, very much for her support, and indeed for her questions. She asked about the definition of a plant nursery, which it is quite true is not in the legislation. A plant nursery ground, as I understand it, is where small plants or trees are grown in the initial stages of their life with a view to selling them later to somebody else to complete the growing process. A market garden, which would not be subject to rating, is where fruit, vegetables and flowers are produced to final crop and then sold directly or indirectly to members of the public for consumption. Sometimes businesses are both, in which case there is a split assessment. I hope that is helpful I very much agree with the noble Lord about the importance of support for the agricultural exemption and the sector generally, which I think, given the contributions made, is shared across the House I come back to the noble Earl’s point and understand how the confusion could arise, but HMRC is a non-ministerial department and it is clearly not open to us to interfere in valuation tribunal decisions, and still less, on the same basis, in the Court of Appeal I thank noble Lords very much for their support on this.