Asked by: Ed Davey (Liberal Democrat - Kingston and Surbiton)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what guidance he plans to make to billing authorities on which businesses are eligible for support from the £1.5 billion business rate relief fund as announced on 25 March 2021.
Answered by Jesse Norman
Funding for businesses affected by the COVID-19 pandemic that have not otherwise been eligible for existing reliefs will be available once the legislation relating to material change in circumstance provisions has passed and Local Authorities (LAs) have established their own local relief schemes. The Government will support LAs to do this as quickly as possible, including through new burdens funding.
Formal guidance will follow in due course, setting out the specific considerations that Local Authorities (LAs) should have regard for when providing relief. Relief will be for LAs to award on a discretionary basis.
Asked by: Ed Davey (Liberal Democrat - Kingston and Surbiton)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, when the £1.5 billion business rate relief fund, announced on the 25th March 2021, will be distributed to businesses.
Answered by Jesse Norman
Funding for businesses affected by the COVID-19 pandemic that have not otherwise been eligible for existing reliefs will be available once the legislation relating to material change in circumstance provisions has passed and Local Authorities (LAs) have established their own local relief schemes. The Government will support LAs to do this as quickly as possible, including through new burdens funding.
Formal guidance will follow in due course, setting out the specific considerations that Local Authorities (LAs) should have regard for when providing relief. Relief will be for LAs to award on a discretionary basis.
Asked by: Ed Davey (Liberal Democrat - Kingston and Surbiton)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate he has made of the potential value of unresolved business rate appeals that have been made on the grounds of material changes of circumstance due to the covid-19 outbreak for 2020-21.
Answered by Jesse Norman
The Government announced on 25 March that it intended to legislate so that market-wide economic changes to property values should be considered at general rates revaluations, and therefore would rule out COVID-19 related material change of circumstance (MCC) claims that could lead to appeals.
At that point, around 170,000 business rates assessments had claims made for MCCs (in England). Some businesses made multiple claims on the same property and this figure excludes those. No claims have progressed to formal appeal as yet (the claims are at the initial Check or Challenge stage of the process).
No cases have yet been settled by the Valuation Office Agency (VOA) and the value of any rating assessment reductions would depend on the facts of each individual property, and the value of any business rates bill reduction on any reliefs to which the ratepayer may be entitled.
Asked by: Ed Davey (Liberal Democrat - Kingston and Surbiton)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate he has made of the number of business which applied made business rate appeals under material changes of circumstances due to the covid-19 outbreak in 2020-21.
Answered by Jesse Norman
The Government announced on 25 March that it intended to legislate so that market-wide economic changes to property values should be considered at general rates revaluations, and therefore would rule out COVID-19 related material change of circumstance (MCC) claims that could lead to appeals.
At that point, around 170,000 business rates assessments had claims made for MCCs (in England). Some businesses made multiple claims on the same property and this figure excludes those. No claims have progressed to formal appeal as yet (the claims are at the initial Check or Challenge stage of the process).
No cases have yet been settled by the Valuation Office Agency (VOA) and the value of any rating assessment reductions would depend on the facts of each individual property, and the value of any business rates bill reduction on any reliefs to which the ratepayer may be entitled.
Asked by: Ed Davey (Liberal Democrat - Kingston and Surbiton)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the EU’s sustainable finance action plan; and what steps he plans to take to ensure that the financial services sector in the UK is competitive in sustainable finance.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
The UK supported the development of the EU Sustainable Finance Action Plan whilst a member state and has committed to match its ambition in the UK. The Green Finance Strategy, published in 2019, set out a comprehensive approach to greening the financial system, mobilising finance for clean and resilient growth, and capturing the resulting opportunities for UK firms.
We have so far delivered on and exceeded the ambition set out in that Strategy: We havee set up the Green Finance Institute; become the first major country to mandate TCFD disclosures; committed to implement a green taxonomy; and signalled our intention to issue a Green Gilt at a total of £15bn and will also offer an innovative retail savings product alongside it.
We’ve augmented the Government’s Economic Objectives and the remit of the principal financial regulators to support environmental sustainability and the transition to net zero, and established the UK Infrastructure Bank with a mandate to tackle climate change.
On the international stage, taking advantage of our role as President, we recently secured commitment of the G7 to support moving towards mandatory climate-related financial disclosures, to bring others up to our level of commitment. As we work towards COP26 we have established the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero, to foster ambition and action for Net Zero in the finance sector and are supporting the convergence and development of international standards in sustainable finance through working with the IFRS and the International Platform on Sustainable Finance.