Rating (Empty Properties) Bill

I am grateful for that direction from the Chair, Sir Alan, although I was waiting to hear how amendments Nos. 2 to 5 could get us from planning permission to the future of the British economy; I thought that we might soon move on to foreign affairs, too. The hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove), whose speeches I always enjoy, clearly never had a train set as a young boy. His education is incomplete, because the purpose of the guard’s van, as any young boy or, I would imagine, young girl would know, is to put the brakes on and slow the train down, not to round it off. The hon. Gentleman commented on the consultation, on the relationship between Her Majesty’s Treasury and my Department, and on the important issue of regeneration and the way in which the Bill interacts with those matters. Again, he put words in my mouth when he claimed that I described speculative property developers as wicked individuals. May I repeat that the Bill is not based on the premise that there are deliberate attempts to construct buildings that remain empty? It does, however, give people an incentive to put buildings into the market. None of those matters, however, are dealt with in the amendments. At the core of the debate is the issue of planning, and the hon. Gentleman contended that buildings that are subject to planning application or which are awaiting decisions should be exempt. If we accepted the amendments, every sensible business person in the country—and business people are sensible—would whack in a planning application, and the non-domestic rating system would collapse, because people can submit such applications as often as they want and for as many different schemes as they want to. The amendments would therefore not achieve the objective claimed by the hon. Gentleman. I listened carefully to the hon. Gentleman’s argument about planning delivery incentives. If we followed his logic, businesses could exempt themselves from rates by submitting a planning application, and most of them would do so. Consequently, local authorities would face a funding crisis, because the amount of money they receive from business rates constitutes, off the top of my head, about 20 per cent. of their income. They would therefore have to deal with applications in a matter of seconds, public consultation would go out the window, and the vicious circle would continue. Of course, that is hypothetical and would not arise, but that is the logic of the hon. Gentleman’s argument, so the amendments would not achieve what he said they would. He tempted me to describe our planning law proposals, but I will resist the temptation because, first, it is outside the remit of the amendment and, secondly, I am not daft. He will therefore have to wait to see the proposals.