Local Government Finance Bill

Debate between Baroness Kramer and Earl of Lytton

Thursday 5th July 2012 Grand Committee

[Baroness Kramer]

I will just add a word because the points that the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, makes are important. One reason why we framed Amendment 53 as we did is so that the Treasury can take a look at projects. In the United States no federal approval takes place—essentially, it is the state that decides off its own bat. In the UK, we are saying to the Treasury, “We are not going to just say to local authorities, ‘Do as you will’”. The Treasury has the opportunity to come in and take a serious look and will give permission, but on a project-by-project basis.

I was on the board of Transport for London after the Jubilee line was completed. The point the noble Earl makes is the reverse one, and the Jubilee line is an ideal example. Even with overruns, the Government put in something like £3.5 billion to build it and developers walked off with something in excess of £30 billion in profit because of the increased values around the various stations, extra rents, land prices and whatever else. At least now, with the opportunity to capture increased business rates, we can get some of that money in to create the project in the first place.

In effect, what happened in London was that the money did not circulate back and the whole Jubilee line project was delayed for years until the Government thought that they could find capacity within the public accounts. It would have happened immediately, and been of great benefit to this country, if people had been looking at TIF financing structures. That is one of the reasons why they are so valuable.

[The Earl of Lytton]

My Lords, that was what I was trying to say in terms of the Jubilee line, so I am sorry if I gave a false impression. These things are vitally important to leverage in that sort of level of finance. My only concerns are the times we live in. If one is dealing with a development appraisal in conventional valuation terms, the process contains a high number of price-sensitive variables, so much so that my professional body, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, does not really advise using that sort of development appraisal, or residual valuation, approach for producing what it calls a regulated purpose valuation because of the inherent number of price-sensitive variables. I do not want to pour cold water on things—I simply wanted to point out that TIF is a tremendously good idea but we must make sure that the circumstances are ones in which it can robustly survive.