RATING AND VALUATION (SCOTLAND) BILL (Hansard, 22 July 1952)

§ THE EARL OF SELKIRK
My Lords, this is a short but rather technical Bill which deals with the mechanics of valuation in Scotland. I think it is substantially non-controversial. I will try to explain in simple language what it tries to do, and if noble Lords wish to raise any questions of detail, I will endeavour to deal with them in reply. Perhaps I should explain that in Scotland rates are paid both by owners and by occupiers of properties, and that any company or body having continuous land or heritage in more than one rating authority—these, of course, are mostly public utilities, waterworks, tramways and the like—may be assessed by the Assessor of Public Undertakings instead of by the local assessor. There is not a close connection between the clauses of the Bill and, if I may, I shall deal with each one shortly.
Clause 1 deals with public undertakings which occupy but do not own a property. In such cases the Bill makes it clear that the assessment will be made by the local assessor and not by the Assessor of Public Undertakings. Clause 2 deals with sub-post offices where accommodation, services and staff are provided by contract with the Postmaster General. Such property has recently been held by the Court to be occupied by the Crown and hence to avoid liability for rates. This clause makes it clear that sub-post offices are not occupied by the Crown and, accordingly, will have to pay rates. It is considered that this is proper, because the contracts drawn up by the Post Office calculate that rates are to be paid by the contractors acting as sub-postmasters. Clause 3 enables a date to be prescribed by which the Assessor of Public Undertakings shall inform the rating authority of the assessment made, and thereby permits adjustments to be made to these assess-merits where they are considered necessary. Clause 4 enables the Assessor of Public Undertakings to make adjustments on his roll in the light of decisions by the Valuation Court. Previously, this could not he clone without specific reference to the Court in each case. Clause 5 enables the date to be prescribed by which the Assessor of Public Undertakings can require information to be 118 furnished to him. Clause 6 gives the Court of Session additional powers to regulate appeals to the Valuation Court by act of sederunt. This Bill has the general agreement of local authorities in Scotland and passed through another place without Amendment. I beg to move that the Bill be now read a second time.

§ LORD MORRISON
My Lords, I agree entirely with what the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, has said about this Bill. It is technical and, what is much more remarkable, it has passed through another place without any considerable amount of disputation. I think that is a notable achievement in these days of political tension. So far as I am aware, this Bill is one of the necessary measures that would have been brought forward whichever Government were in power, and there is no political bias whatever. I should like to add that my noble friend Lord Greenhill, who is more acquainted with these rating problems than I am, is here to-day and I believe that he intends to raise a technical point.

§ LORD GREENHILL
My Lords, as my noble friend, Lord Morrison, has said, I should like to say a word about this Bill. I agree with the noble End, Lord Selkirk, that it is mainly a non-controversial measure, and, considering its limited nature, I should have had no comment at all to offer but for Clause 2. Clause 2 remedies an anomaly under which local authorities have suffered in, the past, in the sense that it was not clear whether sub-post offices were Crown-occupied until the court decided that they were Crown-occupied and therefore were not liable to rates. Local authorities will benefit to the extent that they now will receive rates from sub-post offices. As the noble Earl is probably aware, both the Association of Local Authorities, of which I am a member, and the Counties of Cities Association, on which I am the representative of the local authorities, have asked that another anomaly should be remedied—that of premises occupied by the Territorial Army Association. Owing to the increased activities of Territorial Army associations and the need for acquiring premises for the housing of their instructors, quite a problem is now arising. The question whether a large 119 number of houses owned by the Territorial Army Association are owned by the Crown and occupied by the Crown is not clear, except that the Territorial Army Association say that they are Crown-occupied and, therefore, do not attract rates. So far as I can understand, the Treasury say: "We do not pay any money in lieu of rates," and therefore, presumably the property cannot be Crown-occupied. But the effect of all that is that local authorities are not receiving rates in respect of these premises.
What we are asking is that Her Majesty's Government should apply the same principle to Territorial Army Association houses as they have done in the case of the sub-post office. I do not know that we are asking for very much by asking the Government to do that, because, if my information is correct, the courts have already decided that Territorial Army Association properties are Crown-occupied, and therefore that there should be a payment made in lieu of rates. But, since the fact is that no such payment is being made, local authorities are losing. This has raised a considerable amount of heat. For example, in Glasgow, when the Bill came before the Parliamentary Bills Committee there, the suggestion was made that we should deprive these houses of such services as water, sewerage, and so on, in order to compel some kind of payment of rates to the local authority. In the case of the Scottish Counties of Cities Association I came across a Minute of a meeting held on May 30 last, the rubric of which is Territorial Army Properties. With your Lordships' permission, I should like to read it to you. It says: That a circular had been sent to Members of Parliament for Scottish constituencies intimating that this Association supported the representations made by the Association of County Councils in Scotland that provision should be made in the Rating and Valuation (Scotland) Bill to remove the exemption from local rating conferred on Territorial Army Properties by the Volunteer Militia Act, 1863. What seems to me to be peculiar, if not significant, is that this Minute also reports: There was submitted a letter dated 17th inst. from the Association of County Councils in Scotland, forwarding a copy of a letter which that Association had received 120 from the Scottish Unionist Members' Committee, and a copy of a letter which that Association had sent to the Scottish Home Department. The letter from the Scottish Unionist Members' Committee indicated that the letter which the Association of County Councils had sent to Members of Parliament had been considered, and it was understood that, although the case for removing the exemption from local rating conferred on Territorial Army premises under the Volunteer Militia Act, 1863, might be sound, the pressure of Parliamentary business made it impossible to press for such an amendment. It seems to me that the pressure of Parliamentary business ought not to prevent this anomaly from being removed, by including as non-Crown-occupied property those premises now owned by the Territorial Army Association. The Scottish Counties of Cities Association resolved on that date, …that this Association were strongly of opinion that the anomaly should be removed by an appropriate amendment of the Rating and Valuation (Scotland) Bill, and that only in the event of such an amendment not being possible should an assurance be sought that steps should be taken to remove the anomaly on a subsequent occasion. I have already suggested that it is opportune now for the anomaly to be removed, and that, as this Bill goes through, the Government should include a clause similar to that dealing with sub-post offices, which would remove the exemption of Territorial Army properties from non-payment of rates. I believe that that could be done, for as recently as last Friday the City Assessor at Glasgow obtained a decision from the sheriff court of Lanarkshire in which I believe it was decided that the occupants of Territorial Army Association houses were liable to occupiers' rates; and I think I am right in saying that it follows from that decision that the owners of those properties become liable for rates. If that is not right, no doubt the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, will correct me.

§ THE EARL OF SELKIRK
I am afraid I do not know that particular case.

§ LORD GREENHILL
It is a very recent case. But if that is true—and I have no reason to doubt it—it seems to me that you have there a convincing argument for the inclusion in this Bill of a clause covering the removal of the exemption which these houses now enjoy. So far as Glasgow is concerned, the amount is quite considerable—I think it has been estimated at something like 121 £10,000 a year which the City is losing in this respect; and there would be a proportionate loss on rates in other parts of Scotland. For those reasons, I hope the noble Earl, Lord Selkirk, will arrange for the inclusion of some such clause in this Bill. However, should he resist the desire to have it included, perhaps he will give us a distinct undertaking that he will give consideration to the matter and embody it at a subsequent date if he finds it at all possible to do so.

§ THE EARL OF SELKIRK
My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Morrison, and the noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, for the general welcome which they have given to this Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Greenhill, has raised a point which I agree is not without substance: it is one which is being pressed by the Scottish County Councils' Association, and on which Members of Parliament have been circulated. The position of Territorial Army buildings does not, in fact, rest on the Statute. Since the Territorial Army Association was started in 1907, I understand that it has been accepted, by analogy, that the position of their property is the same as that which applied to the previous organisation, the Volunteers. It has always been assumed that that was Crown property, in, I suppose, precisely the same way as property belonging to the War Office, the Air Ministry or the Admiralty at the present time. The noble Lord has pressed that rates should be paid on that property, and suggests that this is the same principle as that which exists in regard to sub-post offices. If I may say so, I do not think the noble Lord is quite right. It has more or less been assumed until quite recently that sub-post offices were not Crown Property. A recent court decision said that they were Crown property, and this Bill does no more than put the position as it was before the recent decision of the court. So that it is not quite the same thing. Whereas the Territorial Army Association premises have been assumed to be Crown Property without serious alteration since 1907—

§ LORD GREENHILL
Would the noble Earl answer this question? Can he say whether the Treasury in that case made 122 a payment to local authorities in lieu of rates as they do in respect of other properties?

§ THE EARL OF SELKIRK
I am coming to that, if I may. The noble Lord had two ideas running through the theme of his speech, by which he could get something more out of the Treasury on behalf of local authorities. That, in point of fact, is what it amounts to, put in blunt language. One idea is lo put it in the Statute that they are not Crown-occupied, so that rates have to be paid; and the other is to persuade the Chancellor of the Exchequer to make a payment in lieu of rates. The noble Lord said—I do not think he meant it—that the courts have decided that they were Crown property and, therefore, that payment in lieu of rates should be made. That, of course, is not correct.

§ LORD GREENHILL
That is my information.

§ THE EARL OF SELKIRK
With great respect, that is not a matter for the courts; that is a matter exclusively for the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The noble Lord's remarks will, of course, be passed to the Chancellor of the Exchequer for consideration. I have no doubt that the fact that Territorial Association property is growing may be a matter of importance. I will not say more than that at the moment. I must say that the comparison with the sub-post office is not on all fours, because, so far as the Postmaster General is concerned, when he is in occupation of a building by his own staff then it becomes Crown Property at once. The analogy there would be that the Territorial Army buildings would remain Crown property. This is a matter which applies to the whole of the United Kingdom, and if we did decide it on principle it would not be appropriate to include this in a Bill which deals exclusively with Scotland. Therefore, I lope the noble Lord will not press this matter. So long as this remains Crown property it is a matter for the Chancellor of the Exchequer by an ex gratia payment and not by any obligation.