Instruments related to COVID-19
Valuation for Rating (Coronavirus) (England) Regulations 2023
(SI 2023/240)
17.This instrument ensures that the rateable values of non-domestic property on the new 2023 rating list cannot be challenged or changed on the ground that measures introduced to deal with the coronavirus pandemic, such as government guidance on business closures, constituted a ‘material change of circumstances’. Rateable values, in essence the annual rental value of a property, determine the business rates that ratepayers pay. They are updated through revaluations to ensure changes in the rental market are fairly reflected in the tax base. Revaluations currently take place every five years.5 In between revaluations, rateable values can only be changed to reflect ‘material changes of circumstances’, such as physical changes to a property or its use.
18.The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) explains that the pandemic led to many ratepayers attempting to challenge their valuations by arguing that the Government’s interventions concerning the use of property, such as businesses having to close or maintain social distancing, were material changes of circumstances. DLUHC says that if successful, the valuations of properties would have been impacted across a wide range of properties and sectors, leading to piecemeal valuations, unfair distribution of the tax burden and constant reassessment of relevant properties. The changes made by this instrument will therefore ensure that the Government’s policy on coronavirus will not lead to changes in rateable values between revaluations. According to DLUHC, this mirrors the policy in the Rating (Coronavirus) and Directors Disqualification (Dissolved Companies) Act 2021, which made provision for dealing with coronavirus in relation to the 2017 rating list.
5 The Government intend to reduce the time between revaluations to three years, see the Rating Lists (Valuation Date) (England) Order 2023 (SI 2023/231).