Drainage Rates (Disabled Persons) Bill (Hansard, 8 May 1986)

§ Baroness Lane-Fox
My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time.
As your Lordships may be aware, my interest in matters concerning disabled people started in Yorkshire 50 years ago and was continued in Oxfordshire. Now in London I work with a number of national organisations and individuals connected with and affected by disability. I am therefore grateful to the Member for Reading East for introducing in another place this short but worthwhile Bill. Its object is to reinstate a benefit which had been unintentionally withdrawn from certain disabled members of the community. The oversight occurred at the time of the Rating (Disabled Persons) Act 1978. Although the numbers affected may not be large, and the sums involved are small, I believe that your Lordships will agree that any financial advantage due to this special category should not be denied to them one moment longer than is necessary.
The Member for Reading East worked closely with the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food on the drafting of the Bill and they are agreed on the desirability and content of it. The circumstances that led to this arose through a change in the law in 1978. Before that date the rateable value of property occupied by disabled people or by institutions that cater for them, was reduced so that the general rates paid here were correspondingly lowered. Drainage 876 rates payable on property within internal drainage districts, were, and still are, based on rateable values. Prior to 1978, therefore, disabled people enjoyed the same benefit on their drainage rates as I have described.
It was in the Rating (Disabled Persons) Act 1978 that the basis on which assistance given to disabled people in respect of rates was altered. Rateable values were no longer reduced for the purposes I have already stated. That method of benefit was abolished. Instead, the current system was introduced whereby local authorities issue rates rebates in respect of disabled people. The new Act did not extend to the internal drainage board, but even if it had done so the existing land drainage legislation does not permit them to offer any rebate on drainage rates. Therefore those disabled people who live in internal drainage districts have been unavoidably deprived of this little benefit.
As a simile, it was as though in 1978 this aspect of rating legislation underwent spring cleaning and in the process lost a small but effective piece of draught excluder. Such accidents are not unknown. Internal drainage districts are established in areas where there are special drainage problems and comprise land which is protected from danger and which derives benefit from drainage work. The areas concerned include those around the Wash, some areas in Suffolk, Norfolk, Kent, Somerset, Nottinghamshire and Yorkshire. Primarily they comprised agricultural lands, but latterly some have been subject to development.
The districts are managed by internal drainage boards with powers to levy drainage rates under the 1976 Acts to finance drainage operations. The board itself is elected by the drainage ratepayers. As I understand it, although rateable values form the basis of assessment of drainage rates on residential properties, they are adjusted to represent a site value so that drainage rates can be levied on a comparable valuation to agricultural land.
Under the Rating (Disabled Persons) Act a disabled person living at home receives relief in regard to the special features or facilities needed to cope with his or her disability. As a grateful recipient of such benefit I am reminded, in a lighter vein, of a situation in a game of bridge when a player is awarded points for the insult. In this case it is a rebate on the insult of being disabled. Knowing the cost of expenditure required through disability, I believe that these rebates are fully justified. Payments are on a standard scale. Institutions used wholly by disabled people receive a full rebate on the rates and those used predominantly for this purpose receive rebate on those parts of the building used for these cases.
The purpose of this Bill is of course to correct the omission—to restore the relief from drainage rates left out of the Rating (Disabled Persons) Act 1978. It applies only to England and Wales as does the Land Drainage Act.
Clause 1 requires rating authorities which have granted a rebate under the Rating (Disabled Persons) Act 1978 on a hereditament situated in an internal drainage district to give the internal drainage board written notice of that rebate. The written notice would state the gross amount of the general rate and the 877 rebate, the hereditament to which it related, and the period for which the rebate has been granted. On the receipt of that notice, the IDB would grant corresponding relief of any drainage rates chargeable in respect of that hereditament by reducing the drainage rates payable or by repaying any amount overpaid. Rebates for individual ratepayes are likely to be quite small—less than £20 or thereabouts per annum—and for institutions some few hundred pounds.
Clause 2 is self-explanatory. The provisions would come into effect on 1st April 1987, the start of the financial year. I beg to move.

§ Lord Swinfen
My Lords, I apologise to the House for not having put my name down. I was not sure that I would he able to be here.
I should like to give this small but very important Bill a warm welcome. Many severely physically and mentally disabled people are among those with the least opportunity of raising money by their own efforts because they are unable to work, and therefore any relief that will help them to live a more normal and acceptable life is to be welcomed.

§ Lord Graham of Edmonton
My Lords, I am glad that I hesitated long enough for the noble Lord, Lord Swinfen, to make his very effective intervention. It gives this piece of legislation a warm welcome. From these Benches, we do so too.
May I first apologise for the absence of the noble Lord, Lord John-Mackie, who suffered a fall earlier today and was in considerable pain and discomfort. On the advice of his colleagues he has gone home because he needs to rest. He apologises to noble Lords. As my noble friend briefly explained to me, this is more a disabled persons' matter than a drainage matter because we are dealing with the issue of rates. Nevertheless, we are dealing with the impact of this piece of legislation on many disabled people. The intention of the Bill is to apply equity and to put right something which from time to time inadvertently, disadvantages people; but even if the Bill did intend to give an advantage, we would not want to stand in the way of giving it a smooth passage.
As the noble Baroness is aware, the Bill stands or falls not on its merit but on the intentions of the Government, because if the Government are kind to it, it will make very speedy progress. I cannot believe that the intentions of the Bill are not acceptable to the Minister; but no doubt he may have something in his notes which may raise caveats as to timing, suitability, priorities and other matters. If he does not, I shall be delighted and so will many people outside this House.
The noble Baroness kept referring to internal drainage; at times it could have been "infernal" rather than "internal". I am sure that perversity does not enter into this, but very often there is a strict interpretation of the words on the face of an Act. I congratulate the noble Baroness, who is motivated not 878 least because she is in a position whereby this bears upon her own particular circumstance. I imagine that she speaks for thousands of people. I do not believe that she mentioned the number, but not many people will be affected by this measure who are not disabled and even fewer would be affected who are disabled. Even if only dozens or hundreds, and not thousands, are affected, if we can put right something which I understand was omitted from the Rating (Disabled Persons) Act 1978, the short time that we take tonight and the time taken in future in this House and in another place will I hope ensure a speedy passage for the Bill. On this side of the House not only shall we not impede it, but we wish it well.

§ Lord Skelmersdale
My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Graham of Edmonton, I feel a little in loco parentis this evening, and I am sorry to learn that the noble Lord, Lord John-Mackie, is indisposed. I trust that he will recover quickly from his fall.
Fear not! the Government welcome this little Bill which, as my noble friend has said, restores to disabled persons relief from drainage rates which was unintentionally removed by the Rating (Disabled Persons) Act 1978. Until then relief from both general rates and the special drainage rates payable in areas covered by internal drainage boards was provided by adjustment of the rateable values of properties occupied by disabled persons.
The 1978 Act—which I was amused to learn went through this House at exactly the same sort of hour as this Bill is likely to go through and was referred to as the Hughes and Hughes Bill—abolished this system in favour of rebates on general rates, but overlooked similar provision for drainage rates. I am bound to say that I am surprised that that was allowed to go unnoticed, especially when I recall that both my noble friend Lord Swinton and his noble kinswoman spoke on the Second Reading of the then Bill.
This Bill rectifies the matter by providing relief on drainage rates in proportion to the rebate on general rates. I can assure my noble friend Lady Lane-Fox that the Government will give any help they can to ensure that the moves which she is making to right an injustice that has been inadvertently imposed on the disabled are included on the statute book in short order.
At this point I think it is right to welcome the initiative of my honourable friend the Member for Reading East in steering this Bill through the intricacies of the Private Member's procedure in another place. I should like to commend my noble friend Lady Lane-Fox for taking up the baton which will give a little help to members of the community who, as my noble friend Lord Swinfen has said, are less able to care for themselves than the rest of us.

§ Baroness Lane-Fox
My Lords, I should like to thank my noble friend the Minister and everyone who has wished this Bill well. I now move that the Bill be read a second time.

§ Lord Skelmersdale
My Lords, I beg to move that the House do now adjourn during pleasure until eight o'clock.