Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what estimate he has made of the net value of business rate revenue reallocated to all unitary authorities in England except those in the Manchester and Liverpool city regions through the system of top-ups and tariffs in the current financial year; and what the net value of such revenue reallocated to all such unitary authorities was in 2015-16.

The 2015-16 business rates tariffs and top-ups for all authorities can be found on the gov.uk website: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/400329/Key_Information_for_Local_Authorities.xlsx in Column BH of the ‘All Auths’ worksheet.

The 2016-17 and 2017-18 business rates tariffs and top-ups for all authorities can be found on the gov.uk website: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/499148/Key_info_for_local_authorities.xlsx in Column H of the appropriate year’s worksheet.

As the Honourable Member will be aware, the Government has announced that by the end of this Parliament, local government will be able to keep 100 per cent of the business rates raised locally. This is an important part of our plan to take power out of Whitehall and return it to local government. The Government is currently working with the Local Government Association, and engaging directly with local authorities, to develop the detail of this change.