§ 12. Mr. Hardyasked the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland if he will state the average rate contribution per head paid in Northern Ireland; and how this relates to payments in the Yorkshire and Humberside region with which the Province is officially compared for local government finance purposes.
§ Mr. RossiI regret that the hon. Gentleman is mistaken. Northern Ireland is no longer compared with the Yorkshire and Humberside region as a consequence of the 1976 report of the working party on the regional rate which stated that family incomes in Northern Ireland compared unfavourably with those in his region.
Exact comparisons are not possible, but the figures for the average rate contribution are roughly £69 in Northern Ireland and £90 in Yorkshire and Humberside.
§ Mr. HardyThe rate support grant per head is one-third greater in Northern Ireland than it is in Yorkshire. Are the people of Northern Ireland fully aware of their advantageous position in relation to rate support? Further, will the people of Northern Ireland suffer the same degree of retrenchment which the present Government offer Yorkshire and Humberside, and, if so, will the gap be wider or narrower?
§ Mr. RossiThe hon. Member is operating on a false premise. A rate support grant exercise has been conducted in relation to family size, income, needs and resources. This exercise shows that the level of rate in Northern Ireland is approximately correct in that it is close to the level that would have been struck had Northern Ireland been treated as a rating area of England and Wales.
Mr. J. Enoch PowellIs it not a fact that rating cannot be a satisfactory or just system of taxation in the absence of representative local government?
§ Mrs. KnightWill my hon. Friend take note of the fact that, with councillors being paid allowances as they are, there is a great deal of difference between an area which has no councillors at all and one which has? In that instance, Humberside is very much more fortunate than Ulster.