Non-Domestic Rating (Rates Retention and Levy and Safety Net) (Amendment) and (Levy Account Basis of Distribution) Regulations 2019

Debate between Lord Kennedy of Southwark and Lord Beecham

Monday 18th March 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare my local government interests as vice-president of the LGA and as a councillor in Newcastle.

The noble Lord, Lord Shipley, referred to the present situation in respect of business rates. There is a bland assumption by the Government that there is a uniform approach to what can be raised locally, either by domestic rates or business rates, but that is not the position. The amounts that can be generated vary considerably between authorities and the Government have paid little attention to that disparity, in terms of either council tax or business rates.

The Government are making much of the £180 million they are going to restore to authorities. That is £100 million less than the loss that Newcastle City Council alone has sustained in grants from central government since 2010. It is a pitifully small amount and will make little difference to the efforts of local councils—of all political characters—to maintain local services. This is not a substantial change in favour of local government and the Government have to look again at the wider issues of funding a sector of the economy which has been substantially underfunded for the last eight years.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, as the Minister said, the regulations are technical and in that sense I am happy to support them as they stand. I concur with the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, and my noble friend Lord Beecham and I am sure the Minister will respond to the points raised.

The only issue I want to raise concerns Northamptonshire being in the list of council areas that are involved in this scheme. I know the county council is the precept authority, or the collecting authority, but equally it is a council in crisis. The local government reorganisation is happening because the county council has effectively almost gone broke. Is the Minister confident that we should be doing this in this area, in view of the problems that have been widely reported over the past year? That said, I am very happy to support the regulations.

Insolvency of Registered Providers of Social Housing Regulations 2018

Debate between Lord Kennedy of Southwark and Lord Beecham

Tuesday 20th March 2018 Grand Committee

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I refer again to my relevant interests. Has there been any consultation with, for example, the Local Government Association about the possible role of local housing authorities in this situation? In other words, could they be another potential source—I am not sure what phrase I am looking for here—for taking over the responsibility, as opposed to it necessarily being another housing association? In certain areas it might be more feasible for the local housing authority to do that. If the Government have not considered that, could they now take a look at it?

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, I draw the Grand Committee’s attention to my relevant interests, which I mentioned on the previous order. I am always slightly concerned when I hear mention of the dreaded Housing and Planning Act; it really is one of the worst and most ill-thought-out pieces of legislation that any Government have put on the statute book in recent times. Unfortunately, I regularly have to remind noble Lords of that. I think it is a terrible piece of legislation.

Having said that, I read the regulations and their Explanatory Memorandum before today’s Committee and I am happy to support them as far as they go. As we have heard, they seek to extend a new protection regime that already applies to registered social housing providers that are companies to registered societies and charitable incorporated organisations. I am happy to support that.

I am aware that this has come about following discussions between the department and the lending sector. I am also aware of the issue of the Cosmopolitan Housing Group in the north-west of England, which has had problems. Although in the end they were resolved, they have highlighted some weaknesses in the statutory provisions governing insolvency in a registered provider of social housing. Many providers now have to make other arrangements regarding how they do their business and have to cross-subsidise things, which exposes them to more risk, so I am happy to support the regulations before us.

Paragraph 10.3 in the Explanatory Memorandum states:

“An Impact Assessment has not been prepared for this instrument. However, an assessment of impact will be published alongside this instrument”.


I have it here. Can the Minister tell me the difference between an impact assessment and an assessment of impact? Certainly this one is easier to read than the others; perhaps that is the difference. Can he tell us the status of it compared to impact assessment? Are they the same and, if not, why has this arrived? I would be keen to understand that. Having said that, I understand the regulations and am happy to agree them.

Greater Manchester Combined Authority (Amendment) Order 2018

Debate between Lord Kennedy of Southwark and Lord Beecham

Tuesday 20th March 2018 Grand Committee

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as yet another vice-president of the Local Government Association and as a member of Newcastle City Council. Although it is good to hear from my noble friend Lord Smith that they are satisfied with the setup in Manchester and can rely on the current elected Mayor of Manchester not to exercise what is in effect a power of veto, which may not always be the case. Heaven forfend, but we might even get a Conservative or Liberal Democrat Mayor of Manchester elected separately from the constituent councils, in which case one can conceive of certain circumstances which might lead to conflict. So I share the reservations raised about that as a general principle. If Manchester is satisfied with it, so be it, but I should be wary of seeing that provision made in any other authority, and any members who are approached in that light should look carefully at that.

On remuneration, I wonder whether it is intended that this should simply come into force now with no retrospection. It would seem rather unfair if people had devoted considerable time up to now with no remuneration. If possible, it should be open to the authority to pay them, if it thought it reasonable. It would not be a duty to do so in any case, but it is invidious if those who have served already are not to be compensated to some extent as, presumably, they may well be in future.

My other question is whether any of these changes should be generalised and applied to all the combined authorities. If not, there will be a differential pattern up and down the country, particularly in relation to the remuneration of councillors. It would be helpful to know whether the Government will look at that, rather than bringing a succession of individual pieces of secondary legislation to give the power across the piece. I would be interested to know whether the Government have considered that or will consider it. If not, I suspect that we will spend time in this Room on a number of occasions simply repeating debates on the provision of a power that might be better conferred at the outset. It would not be a requirement, but I believe that the process of conferring the power should be simplified. Perhaps the Minister will think about that and get back to me and others in due course.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, I draw to the attention of the Committee my relevant registered interests as a councillor and a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

I have read the order and the Explanatory Memorandum. As the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, said, the proposal that the mayor has to be on the winning side for a vote to be carried means that the mayor has a veto. I hear what my noble friend Lord Smith of Leigh says. He is a member of the combined authority, so I accept his expertise on these matters. If Manchester is happy with it, then so be it, but it is an odd way of working—it seems a bit cumbersome. As I say, if that is how it wants to work, we are fine with it. It means that, in effect, the mayor has a veto. Another way of operating would be to let the mayor take the decision.

A couple of points have come out of the debate. My noble friend Lord Smith of Leigh mentioned the Bus Services Act. I remember that, during the debates on the Bill, the Government were insistent that you had to have a mayor in order to get the bus franchising powers automatically. That was a big issue. Many of us could not understand why you had to have a mayor, but the Government were insistent. It is regrettable that, although the Act has been on the statute book for about a year, we have not moved forward on this. This is not a good place to be. Perhaps the Minister can come back to us on that, because I believe that it is important for authorities outside London to have powers to control their bus services—the fares, the routes and the timetables. Those powers exist in London, where we have a good bus service, and are very attractive to combined authorities.

My noble friend Lord Beecham referred to the differential pattern in the combined authorities. Manchester seems to have the most powers. Others are different, but can evolve over time. I believe that local government in England has a problem. It is a bit of a mess. We have all sorts of tiers of local government. Buckinghamshire is going to become two unitaries and there will also be two unitaries in Northamptonshire. I recall in one debate the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, listing the five authorities that potentially regulate where he lives in Cambridgeshire. It looks to me to be a bit of a mess now. At some point, we will have to look at what we want for local government in England outside London. This patchwork is not necessarily the right way to go.

I am happy with both parts of the order. The proposal for the remuneration of independent members seems sensible and I agree with it.

Non-Domestic Rating (Alteration of Lists and Appeals) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2018

Debate between Lord Kennedy of Southwark and Lord Beecham

Thursday 1st February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, as we have heard, the regulations before your Lordships’ House this afternoon provide for the imposition of financial penalties for giving false information in respect of a proposal and also provide for an appeal against the imposition or the amount of a financial penalty. I am happy to support these proposals, and in doing so draw the attention of the House to my relevant interests in the register, namely being a councillor in the London Borough of Lewisham and a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

Many years ago, in the 1980s, I was a member of a rating appeals tribunal and I agree with the Explanatory Notes, which state in paragraph 7.3 that little supporting evidence was supplied, what came in came in late, and most appeals,

“did not result in either an appeal hearing or a change to the rating list”.

That was what used to go on in the appeals I used to attend—it was certainly my experience serving on a tribunal in London. Looking at the papers there seem to be only two levels of fine. I thought that the purpose of any fine is to provide an element of deterrent. I am not convinced that these levels actually do that: perhaps a sliding scale would have been better, or some link to a rateable value, as I think the noble Lord, Lord Bourne, made reference to. I do not think that any large corporation will be the least bit worried about a £500 fine.

Paragraphs 8.1 and 8.5 of the Explanatory Notes refer to the number of responses to various consultations. Will the noble Lord give the House some more information about the range of responses received, as the notes have only such phrases as “the majority of respondents recognised”, and “many businesses accepted”. A bit more clarity would be useful for us to understand the range of responses that the department actually received. I accept the point, as set out in paragraph 8.6, that,

“in line with other parts of the tax system, ratepayers have a responsibility to take reasonable care when providing information in relation to their tax affairs”,

but coming back to my earlier point, I am not sure a £500 fine helps in any way to focus the mind of a large company or corporation in that respect. I am sure that all companies do these things properly, but if one were to decide that it could gain some advantage by not doing so, it might risk taking a punt. The worst it could get would be a £500 fine but if it got away with it, it might gain many thousands of pounds in a reduced business rate bill. Will the noble Lord address that?

I assume, since there is nothing about it in the papers, that there is no link to inflation, so these figures will wither on the vine, as it were, until the regulations are brought back here in a few years to be uprated. So I am not convinced that the sanctions are strong enough. Having said that, I support them in principle and I look forward to the noble Lord’s response.

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I endorse what other noble Lords have said, particularly my noble friend on the Front Bench. I do not dissent from anything that has been said—I certainly endorse his views about the frankly ridiculously low levels of penalty for failing to comply with the requirements, given the amount of rates that will necessarily be involved in so many cases. My question is about the system more generally. There is well known to be a huge backlog of appeals across the country. That is difficult for local councils to manage because dealing with these issues requires expenditure in its own terms. What are the Government doing to speed up the process of dealing with appeals? Will they make resources available to local authorities to do that? It is an injustice to the local community if these decisions are delayed and is actually not very good for businesses anyway, because they ought to be clear what the position is. Yet for many years delays have taken place and proceedings are very costly.

I ought to remind the House of my local government interests, as a local authority member and, like several Members of this House, an honorary vice-president of the Local Government Association.