Lifeline thrown to small businesses facing empty property rates, says CLA

The CLA has welcomed the Chancellor's decision to help small businesses through the financial crisis with a one-year exemption on empty business property rates – while urging it to make the move permanent.

The Chancellor yesterday (Monday, 24 November) announced plans to make properties with rateable value of £15,000 or less temporarily exempt from empty property tax for the 2009-10 financial year.

CLA President Henry Aubrey-Fletcher said: "This is what the CLA has been calling for. However, we would urge the Government to make it permanent to provide reassurance and stability on a long-term basis for investors in rural business properties for let, especially those with extended borrowings."

"As the Chancellor noted, small and medium businesses are the backbone of the UK's economy and, in this difficult financial time, they are in need all the help they can get."

The CLA President added: "However, as always with reports of this kind, the devil is in the detail, and we are closely examining the entire report and its potential impact on landowners."

Mr Darling said in his pre-budget report: "To help small firms meet their running costs, I can announce a temporary increase in the threshold for empty property relief. For 2009/10, empty commercial properties with a rateable value below £15,000, will be exempt from business rates. This exemption covers an estimated 70 per cent of all empty properties."

CLA MEDIA CONTACTS:

For further information and interviews:

Oliver Wilson, Director of Communications, 020 7460 7936 or 07702 928828, ollie.wilson@cla.org.uk,

Phillippa Coates, Press Officer, 020 7460 7934, phillippa.coates@cla.org.uk

Out of hours duty phone: 020 7201 9511.

Media Contacts

Ollie Wilson
Director of Communications

T: 020 7460 7936
F: 020 7460 7962
ollie.wilson@cla.org.uk

Lisa O'Brien
National Press Officer

T: 020 7460 7934
lisa.obrien@cla.org.uk

Out of hours: 020 7201 9511

Join the CLA today

Anyone who owns rural land or runs a rural business will benefit from joining the CLA.

Click here to find out how

The CLA Game Fair 2012

20 - 22 July 2012 Belvoir Castle. Grantham, Leicestershire.

CLA Member Ticket Box Office

Visit The CLA Game Fair website

Advice on the healthcare options available to you

More articles and documents

Don’t forget rural-urban digital divide, says CLA
[News Archive]
[18 October 2010]

Country Land and Business Association Limited. Registered Office: 16 Belgrave Square, London, SW1X 8PQ. Registered in England and Wales: 6131587. VAT Number: GB 238 7714 35

© 2012 Country Land and Business Association Limited (CLA). All rights reserved. No part of this website may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, or stored in any retrieval system of any nature without prior written permission of the copyright holder except as expressly permitted by law.

Disclaimer

No responsibility for loss occasioned to any person acting or refraining from action in reliance on or as a result of the material included in or omitted in this website can be or is accepted by the author(s), the CLA or its officers or trustees or employees or any other persons.

The Advisory Services are made available to members on the basis that members' rights to compensation and the liability (if any) of CLA and its officers and/or its staff advisers, are restricted in the following ways. In the event of any advice given by any CLA staff adviser being given negligently or otherwise being incorrect no liability whatsoever is accepted by the CLA or its officers or by its staff advisers concerned

(a) towards any person who is not the current CLA member to whom the advice was directly given,

(b) to any person in the respect of consequential loss or loss of profits, or

(c) to any person for any sum exceeding £50,000 in respect of any one enquiry (whether made or responded to orally or in writing and whether dealt with at one time or over a period of time).

Any person making use of the Advisory Services accepts such restrictions. Members should refer to appropriate professional advisers in private practice before taking any particular course of action potentially or actually involving any substantial amounts of money.

Please note that whilst the advisers are able to advise on a wide range of subjects relating to land ownership, they cannot act in place of a member's own solicitor, accountant, surveyor and tax specialist by, for example, drafting documents or corresponding on their behalf and may be precluded, by the rules of their own professions, from advising one CLA member against another CLA member in the case of conflict.

Solicitors Indemnity Fund . Solicitors in the CLA Legal Team are not covered by the Solicitors Indemnity Fund in relation to professional negligence in relation to any advice given by them.

Please note that from time to time telephone calls maybe recorded for training purposes.