My Lords, I support the amendments in this group. At one of my meetings with the Minister and her Bill team I was told that it was not HMRC—or they may have said Treasury—practice to produce an impact assessment as such, and I was directed to a series of notes in lieu. But business rates have an impact on business, employment, entrepreneurial activity and the health of our high streets, and have long seemed a substantial tipping point in decisions about taking on premises, where the tax levied is 50% of the determined market rental value. That puts into shade the collective cost of things such as insurance service charges and other occupational outgoings.
There is a basic imbalance here; I have said so on many occasions in the House and elsewhere. Upfront impact assessments and post-legislative review are exactly what is missing here. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, that small business relief and small business exemptions are almost an admission of the failure of the system we have.
Turning to Amendment 36, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Thurlow, I totally agree with its underlying principle that the tax base for local government finance needs to be broadened, with proportionately less of a burden falling on what we might call the traditional business rate payer. This is becoming an impediment. What are termed fundamental reviews have been a great deal less fundamental than they ought to have been. The system has been creaking for some time and one should take notice when things start to creak; it usually means that something is wrong. I very much relate to these amendments, and I look forward to the Minister’s comments.