Council Tax (New Valuation Lists for England) Bill

It is important that I make myself clear. Because of the timetable of revaluation—the way in which dates are set and brought forward—it was important to ensure that it was stopped at the point at which we would not only be saving money but also introducing clarity and certainty into the process. Making clear that we will wait for Sir Michael, with an extended remit running to the end of this year, is common sense—and administrative common sense at that. Both the 1992 and 1999 Acts have always provided for changes to be made by affirmative powers. Not being completely familiar with the history of that legislation, if I have missed another point I am sure my officials will put me right and I will write to the noble Lord about that. It would certainly be misleading to suggest that the Secretary of State was beyond the scrutiny of the House of Commons. On the powers that we are providing, he is certainly not. The noble Lord, Lord Hanningfield, asked me how soon after Sir Michael Lyons’s report we could expect a revaluation. The answer is that we do not know. Sir Michael may come forward with radical proposals, but we do not know that either. It would be absurd for us to fix a timetable at this point without knowing exactly what the scope of the changes might be. The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, asked me a related question about whether any changes in the structure of local government would affect plans for valuation. We have taken absolutely no decisions on restructuring local government. There is an active debate, as the noble Baroness will know, and clearly our decision on revaluation will be affected by a number of different factors which are not predictable at the moment. The important thing is that we must be clear about what we are doing. That is why we are sharing the information that we have, making the Lyons committee as open as possible and being clear in the Bill that revaluation is postponed and not cancelled. But predicting how and when we can do this is very difficult for us to do at the moment. The questions that the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, raised—the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, picked up on this point as well—were to do with timetables for valuation and the impact on the valuation office itself. I now know a little more how the valuation office works and I am extremely impressed by just what has been achieved in the timetable to date, both in the digitisation process—which has been a massive undertaking—and in the work that was done for the revaluation. We have had discussions at Second Reading and parliamentary Questions about the costs of that process, and the savings in stopping where we did, but the point is what the VOA has experienced in gearing up for revaluation. The fact that the database is now in place will make it easier to restart a revaluation when a decision is taken because digitisation gives us more flexibility to move at speed and to draw the information down. So we cannot say exactly what notice would be appropriate. Again, it would obviously depend on circumstance. For example, the extent of any reforms would bring us back to the question of when, how and what the reform would actually reflect. All work on revaluation has indeed stopped at the moment, but the point about the valuation office is that it is not there simply for revaluation on a cyclical basis; it has a continuing role to play. It has been very much taken up in the past year or two with the digitisation process and it implications. So valuation continues and the valuation office has a duty to maintain the current list as best it can. Again, I am very impressed with what I have heard about how the office goes about that. I think that I have answered most of the questions that were raised. If I have not, I am sure that noble Lords will tell me and we can do something about it. But, on the basis of the amendment, I urge that it is very important to engage with the review process and not to add in unnecessary uncertainties just at the point when we are trying to work towards stability and predictability in the process. Of course we do not want to narrow down the options or jump to conclusions; we want the debate to be conducted with the greatest confidence in the interests of the people who are most affected.