Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Greenhalgh on 3 December (HL10511), whether they will now answer the question put, namely which local planning authorities in England have set the Community Infrastructure Levy at zero.

Authorities only adopt the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) if, having undertaken the necessary viability analysis, the rates that can be applied justify doing so. Therefore none of the 163 levy charging authorities in England have set a zero levy rate for all levy liable development in their area.

Charging authorities set out their levy rates, including any zero rates, in a charging schedule which is required to be published on their website. Authorities can set different rates for different zones within their authority, by reference to different intended uses of development, by reference to the intended gross internal area of development, and by reference to the intended number of dwellings or units. Categories are not consistently applied across all authorities, but are developed to reflect local circumstances.

CIL charging authorities are able to exempt categories of development either by explicitly setting zero rates within a charging schedule, or by setting rates which refer to other types of development only (for instance, if a charging schedule were to include rates only for residential development, then retail and office development would be exempt).

Because categories of development to which CIL is applied vary between authorities, and can vary within them, it is not possible to accurately summarise how rates apply across all CIL charging authorities. However, all of the 163 CIL charging authorities have set a levy charge for residential development in at least part of their area.