I am sorry; I cannot tell the noble and learned Lord that, but I will make sure that I look into who, including the public, was consulted as part of that review. I will make sure that I get an answer to him and will put it in the Library.
As I said, in response to the concerns of businesses in England, the Government will introduce the transitional relief scheme for 2023. This will mean that 300,000 ratepayers seeing reductions in their rateable value at the revaluation also see an immediate fall in their bills from 1 April this year, rather than seeing those changes phased in over the life of the list. This will make the rates system much fairer and more responsive, and ensure that ratepayers benefit from the revaluation as soon as possible.
The Government also announced a supporting small businesses relief scheme, which will ensure that ratepayers losing some or all of their small business or rural rate relief as a result of the revaluation see their increases capped at a maximum of £600 in 2023-24. This is worth more than £0.5 billion over the next three years and will protect an estimated 80,000 small businesses. This is again on top of generous existing packages of statutory support provided to small businesses through the small business rates relief, which ensures that over 700,000 of our smallest businesses pay no rates at all.
The Levelling-Up and Regeneration Bill provides additional measures to address empty properties on the high street, such as the high street rental auctions. These measures will empower places to tackle decline by bringing vacant units back into use and will seek to increase co-operation between landlords and local authorities. Auctions will make town centre tenancies more accessible and affordable for tenants, including SMEs, local businesses and community groups. A review has only recently concluded and the Government remain committed to delivering on its conclusions. The £7 billion reform package announced at the end of that review and the £13.6 billion package of support announced at the Autumn Statement 2022 will, alongside the 2023 business rates revaluation, deliver vital help to those most in need, such as our high streets, and rebalance the burden of our business rates. In the light of these explanations, I ask noble Lords not to press their amendments.