The following amendments have been selected: amendment 1 in the name of Jane Hutt, amendments 2, 4, 5 and 6 in the name of Paul Davies, and amendment 3 in the name of Rhun ap Iorwerth. If amendment 1 is agreed, amendments 2 and 3 will be deselected. If amendment 2 is agreed, amendment 3 will be deselected.

The next item is the UKIP debate on business rates, and I call on Caroline Jones to move the motion.

Motion NDM6526 Caroline Jones

To propose that the National Assembly for Wales:

1. Believes that:

a) small businesses constitute the economic and social heart of the Welsh high street but that the current business rates regime significantly disadvantages retailers in small towns and cities;

b) business rates are inherently inequitable because they bear little, if any, relation to business profitability and they have a chilling effect on town centres by adding significant costs to the establishment of new businesses;

c) reducing the impact of business rates would help businesses survive the challenges posed by internet shopping and give a significant boost to the high street.

2. Resolves that:

a) as an interim measure, pending the replacement of business rates by a tax related to ability to pay, business premises with a rateable value below £15,000 should be exempt and the rates of business properties within the band of £15,000—£50,000 are reduced by 20%;

b) Welsh local authorities should encourage local trade by offering at least 60 minutes free parking in their town centre car parks;

c) out-of-town shopping developments should bear a greater but reasonable share of the burden of business rates, and such rates should apply to their car parks, to help revive town centres.

Motion moved.

Diolch, Gadeirydd. I’m pleased to move the motion before you today. Before I entered politics, I was a small business owner, operating businesses on the high street in Bridgend and Porthcawl, and I experienced at first hand the challenges facing businesses on our high streets. The motion tabled by my colleagues and me seeks to mitigate some of these challenges. We are calling for the Welsh Government to take action on business rates as a longer-term solution and to introduce better rate relief for small businesses in the short term. This will inject much-needed support for small independent retailers who are struggling, particularly those operating on our high streets.

As the Federation of Small Businesses state in their 2017 manifesto, small independent retailers make a unique and irreplaceable contribution to the character of our streets in our cities, towns and villages. They are vital to local economies throughout the country. A much higher proportion of revenue is recycled into the local community through small businesses than through their local counterparts. Without small independent retailers, our high streets are at risk of becoming either empty shells or smaller versions of out-of-town retail parks. If we want to retain the character of our high streets, from Bridgend to Bangor, from Connah’s Quay to Cowbridge, then we have to act now.

One in every eight retail units are currently empty, and with the Welsh economy lagging behind the other UK nations the outlook for the high street isn’t great. High-street retailers are struggling with increasing rents and business rates, at the same time as facing increasing competition from online and out-of-town retailers who have much lower costs. We have to create a level playing field, and the majority of small businesses and small independent retailers want to see action taken on business rates.

Business rates, as currently constituted, are inherently inequitable as they bear no relation to the profitability of a business. They are a charge based upon the rent of the property, and, as many small high-street retailers have found to their detriment, do not reflect the turnover or profits of the business. Retailers who wish to remain on the high street have no choice but to absorb the additional cost. They can simply move on, as some Ministers have suggested in the past. It is therefore vital to the very survival of our high streets that we replace the current business rates system with a more equitable tax based upon the ability to pay.

This is supported by both the FSB and the Welsh retail consortium. The FSB state that the non-domestic rates system, as it stands, is an unfair and regressive tax that takes no account of a firm’s ability to pay. A business must pay £1 in business rates before it earns £1 in turnover, let alone £1 in profit. This system is no longer fit for purpose and is unable to take account of the changing nature of doing business. A property-based tax, by its nature, unfairly targets businesses in prime locations such as high streets. Infrequent revaluations merely store up trouble, exacerbating a property tax that already lags behind the economic cycle. We agree.

According to the Welsh retail consortium, Welsh retailers want to see fundamental reform of business rates for all, whether that be small, medium or larger-sized business. What is abundantly clear is that the current system is not fit for purpose. It’s deterring investment and leading to shop closures and job losses. We understand that this cannot happen overnight. This is why we are proposing an interim system of rate relief that will see businesses with a rateable value below £15,000 taken out of business rates altogether, and a reduction of 20 per cent for those businesses that fall within the £15,000 to £20,000.

Although business rates are the biggest barrier to the survivability of high-street businesses, they aren’t the only one. Our high streets are facing stiffer competition from online and out-of-town retailers. I believe in a free market but here we don’t have a level playing field, and therefore the odds are stacked against high-street businesses in more than one way. Out-of-town developments benefit from free car parking and those car parks are not included in the business rate valuation. In order to even up the playing field, we are proposing that an offer of at least one hour of parking in town and city centre car parks should be available. We believe this will encourage local trade.

It’s not just the Welsh Government who are to take action to save our high streets. The UK Government also have a role to play. They have to create the economic stability we need for the high street to survive. They also need to look at business taxation. I would like the UK Government to review value added tax when Brexit does materialise. The VAT threshold needs to be raised from the £85,000 it currently is, and a more graduated system introduced. But above all, the Welsh public also have a role to play. We should all prioritise small independent retailers—whenever we can—who offer goods and services at top value very often. To paraphrase the Labour leader’s conference speech, it’s a case of use it or lose it. If the Welsh public value the high street, they have to use the high street. In just under eight weeks, it will be Small Business Saturday, and the Federation of Small Businesses have once again launched the £10 pledge, in which they’re encouraging as many people as possible to pledge that they will spend at least £10 with a local business, a small business, on Saturday 2 December. I have accepted that pledge, as I did last year and the years before it, and I will be supporting Small Business Saturday and I urge everyone here to do likewise.

I urge everyone watching this debate to accept the pledge. Supporting our small high-street businesses ensures that we have a diverse and vibrant local economy. By reducing the threshold on VAT, we can then employ more people and then the economy grows further. I ask you to show your support for the Welsh high street by supporting the motion before you. Diolch yn fawr.

I have selected the six amendments to the motion. If amendment 1 is agreed, amendments 2 and 3 will be deselected; if amendment 2 is agreed, amendment 3 will be deselected. I call on the leader of the house to move formally amendment 1 tabled in her name.

Amendment 1—Jane Hutt

Delete all and replace with:

To propose that the National Assembly for Wales:

1. Recognises the importance of micro, small and medium-sized businesses to the success of communities and the wider Welsh economy.

2. Notes the vital importance of cross-government policies that support businesses on Welsh high streets to thrive and grow.

3. Recognises the Welsh Government’s commitment to supporting high street retailers and other businesses by providing more than £200 million of funding in 2017-18 to support around three-quarters of ratepayers in Wales through rates relief.

4. Acknowledges that in 2017-18, more than half of all businesses across Wales pay no rates at all.

5. Notes the Welsh Government’s intention to put in place a permanent small business rate relief scheme which is simpler, fairer and better targeted towards growing businesses in Wales from April 2018.

Amendment 1 moved.

Formally.

Thank you very much. I call on Nick Ramsay to move amendments 2, 4, 5 and 6 tabled in the name of Paul Davies.

Amendment 2—Paul Davies

Delete point 2 and replace with:

Welcomes the full devolution of business rates to the Welsh Government and the potential this unlocks.

Amendment 4—Paul Davies

Add as new point at end of motion:

Regrets that the Welsh Government has presided over the highest high street vacancy rate in Great Britain in 2017, at 14.5 per cent.

Amendment 5—Paul Davies

Add as new point at end of motion:

Calls on the Welsh Government to:

a) abolish business rates for all small businesses with rateable values of up to £15,000; and

b) reform the business rates system and explore splitting the Welsh multiplier to increase the competitiveness of smaller businesses.

Amendment 6—Paul Davies

Add as new point at end of motion:

Believes that the Welsh Government should extend the funding available to support free parking pilot schemes in Wales.

Amendments 2, 4, 5 and 6 moved.

Diolch, acting Deputy Presiding—Chair, I think is probably easier. I’m pleased to move the amendments today in the name of Paul Davies.

Can I firstly welcome the UK Government’s willingness to devolve business rates to the Welsh Government? We certainly in the Welsh Conservatives believe that that was a step in the right direction. Yes, we did have a certain amount of control over business rates prior to that, but the full devolution of business rates, we believe, brings a real opportunity for the Welsh Government to act in this area—another tool in the economic toolbox, as the First Minister and as the Cabinet Secretary for finance’s predecessor were keen to call it. Having the tool is one thing, using it to improve the business rate regime is another, and this is where we feel that the Government amendment is not acceptable to us. A number of elements of the Government amendment we wouldn’t disagree with. Certainly, the importance of small businesses—that stands to reason; I don’t think anyone would stand up in this Chamber and say that small businesses aren’t of vital importance to the Welsh economy, indeed as Caroline Jones has just made clear.

The vital importance of cross-Government working is a key part of the Government amendment as well, and that’s to be welcomed. In the previous debate, we heard about the importance of Governments working together. We need a joined-up framework between Governments, and the Welsh Government and the UK Government, particularly in the run-up to Brexit, during the Brexit negotiations, which I know many Members, including me, are concerned about.

However, there we part company, you won’t be surprised to know. We don’t believe that the Labour amendment stresses the urgency of addressing the situation and giving businesses across Wales the support that they are crying out for, and have been crying out for for some time. So, as our amendment, amendment 5, makes clear, we need to see more businesses taken out of business rates altogether, and small businesses with a rateable value of up to £15,000 specifically removed from that. We agree with a large part of the UKIP motion in this area, actually. We’ve got differences on some detail, but you’ve also broadly recognised the importance of businesses being taken out of that burden. We would also, as the amendment makes clear, remove the multiplier. That’s now within our grasp with the full devolution of business rates. Of course, all of this is designed to increase competitiveness and improve the economy; that’s what this is all about.

It’s very easy to stand in this Chamber and talk about statistics as though we’re in some sort of vacuum, and I can throw statistics at the Chamber and the Minister will throw them back, but I often feel that we don’t really get to the core of the arguments by doing that. What this is about, as so many debates in this Chamber are about, is improving the lives of people out there, supporting businesses, improving people’s lives, helping more people to support themselves. That’s certainly what I’m here for, and I’m sure other Assembly Members are too. So, let’s be mindful of the effect that the recent revaluation had on businesses across Wales. I won’t forget, because I was inundated, as I’m sure many Assembly Members were, with correspondence, phone calls and e-mails from people who were really, really worried about the effect that the changes to the revaluation would have on their businesses. Of course, it wasn’t a Welsh Government revaluation; the revaluation did happen across the spectrum, across the UK. So, we recognise that the Welsh Government were not to blame for the need to have a revaluation, of course—that’s a necessary part of the economic and business cycle and that had to be addressed. But the way that the revaluation was handled and the way that it was communicated to people across Wales did concern us.

As I said, I received many representations and, in fact, sadly—I checked on this recently—a couple of the businesses whose owners contacted me have already gone—they’re empty, there are boards in the windows. I think that brought it home to me very clearly why I was involved in a petition at that time and why I wanted to help those business owners. So, it wasn’t just scaremongering, as some of us are often accused of doing, it wasn’t making a lot of noise for no reason—the actual results of that revaluation and the lack of proper support for businesses has already had an effect.

As for our last amendment—there should be more support for free parking pilot schemes—I think the Government should be able to—well, I assume you should be able to—support this, because I know that you have already given some support for extending parking pilot schemes across Wales. We’re simply saying that we think that’s a good thing and it should be enhanced. So, we will be voting against the motion in order to get our amendments on the paper, but there’s a lot of good stuff in this motion and I’m pleased that UKIP have brought it to the Chamber today and I hope that there will be support for our amendments.

I call on Adam Price to move amendment 3, tabled in the name of Rhun ap Iorwerth.

Amendment 3—Rhun ap Iorwerth

Delete point 2 and replace with:

Calls on the Welsh Government to:

a) abolish business rates for all businesses with a rateable value of less than £10,000 per year, and provide tapered relief for businesses whose rateable value is between £10,000 and £20,000;

b) make all businesses during their first year of operation exempt from paying any rates in order to encourage new start-ups across Wales;

c) introduce a split multiplier for small and large businesses as is the case in Scotland and England; and

d) explore replacing business rates altogether with alternative forms of taxation which do not discourage employment, town centre regeneration and investment in plant and machinery.

Amendment 3 moved.

Diolch. It’s yet another opportunity for us to discuss the reform of business rates. I mean, I’m not the only one, I’m sure, in this Chamber, to be hit by a tsunami of déjà vu. It seems a perennial in this place that we are constantly returning to this subject, and for good reason, really. This is an anachronistic discredited tax. It’s a bit like the window tax, which was repealed in 1851, but this one is still with us. And for all the reasons that Caroline Jones referred to and Nick Ramsay agreed with, it’s high time that we not just had some reform at the edges, but looked at a completely different way of approaching business taxation. Because, as we move to a situation where physical businesses, otherwise known as shops, in the retail sector in particular are facing huge challenges as we shift to online, then we are loading additional cost on to this sector, which is unsustainable, and the consequences that Nick Ramsay referred to are there to be seen in all of our town centres.

Our amendment set out the policy that we fought the election on. I mean, it goes in a similar direction. We suggested abolishing business rates for all businesses with a rateable value of less than £10,000 a year and then tapered relief up to £20,000. We disagree on some of the details, but I think the principle is clear. We also proposed exempting businesses in the first year of operation in order to encourage business start-ups, introducing a split multiplier for small and large businesses, which is the case in Scotland and in England. But this is the real one, this is the real prize, which is exploring abolishing business rates altogether and replacing them with alternative forms of taxation that do not discourage employment, town-centre regeneration and investment in plant and machinery.

Now, the Government has issued its consultation document. There are two days left, I think, for people who are keen to put their oar in, but it’s a very, very desultory, disappointing document, to be honest with you. One of the first things it says is that the new scheme will be designed within the existing £110 million annual funding envelope. So, where’s the scope for reform there? They also set out some proposals in terms of increasing the threshold for relief, but they’re incredibly modest. I mean, the only viable options, the consultation document says, are increasing the threshold of 100 per cent relief from £6,000 to £8,000. These are crumbs, really, in terms of helping the small business sector in Wales. Increasing the upper threshold for relief from £12,000 to £13,000—well, that’s going to create a transformative effect in our business sector in Wales. And, wait for it, potentially—it’s full of qualified language—increasing the lower threshold to £8,000 and the upper threshold to £13,000. Well, that’s the problem, isn’t it? That’s the lack of ambition in terms of business rate reform and in terms of economic policy in general from this Government.

There’s no mention at all in the Welsh Labour Government’s own consultation document of switching from retail price index to consumer price index indexation. That was actually in their manifesto for the general election at the UK level. No mention of exempting new investment in plant and machinery. I remember John McDonnell hailing that as a radical policy that was going to make a difference to businesses right across the land—England, of course. Yet again, a case of doing and saying one thing when it suits them politically over the border and, in the one part of the United Kingdom that they’re actually in Government, not following through on their own policy. We’re not surprised, are we, but certainly, I think, we’ve a right to be deeply disappointed at the lack of leadership in the Government. We need radical thinking. It certainly isn’t contained within the ambit of the pathetically low ambition statement that we got from the Government in terms of their consultation. We should be looking at leading the rest of the UK in abolishing this outdated tax and creating the platform upon which our businesses can thrive.

The majority of employees are employed in small and medium-sized businesses. The business owners are usually from, or are living near, the community they trade with. Their interest in seeing a sustainable town centre is personal as well as professional, and profits, unlike those of Amazon, Tesco, Asda and the others, are far more likely to stay in the local community rather than be sent to some remote parent company in another country. Since the profits stay in the country, those businesses will be paying their fair share of UK tax, unlike some multinationals.

The current system taxes businesspeople on the basis of the nominal value of their property. This is illogical and focuses on buildings as opposed to the business that operates from them. It seems to forget that behind any small business is a person or people trying to make a living. It’s a regressive tax, and its change to a more progressive model is well overdue, as the empty properties on many high streets in Wales and the comparatively fewer SMEs in Wales illustrate.

Devolution of business rates to Wales enables Wales to take the lead on introducing a progressive and fairer system of business rates. I would like to see business rates based on profit or turnover, with incentives built in so that employers share the benefit of reductions in business rates with employees, in the form of employing more people. For example, business rates could be restructured in such a way that businesses receive a discount or concessionary rate for employing more people. Conditions could be set on the discounts to encourage businesses to employ people at a wage higher than the national minimum. It just needs a little bit of creative thinking here.

For those who claim that such a system would be complicated to administer, they may be right, but this is about the best way to support businesses and pay for local services. I really do believe that where there’s a will, there’s a way, and to stimulate the growth of local economies with a fairer local taxation system, the extra administration that may be caused is well worth it. Before a business starts trading, and before they have earned a single penny through the business, they’re saddled with a big business rates bill. The business rates regime disincentivises business start-ups, and makes life for young businesses more difficult at a time when they need some space in which to grow, turn a profit and start employing people.

I note the Welsh Government’s amendments to our motion, and I’d like to make the following points. Your amendments make much of your support for small businesses, but as long as you continue to stand idly by and allow local authorities to wreck high streets and the local economy by making it harder and more expensive to do business there, your assertions regarding support for small businesses will continue to ring as hollow as they have for the last 20 years. It is all very well to introduce rates relief, but businesses need to be able to plan and budget, which this ad hoc scenario we have at present doesn’t allow.

Member of the Senedd:

Will you take an intervention?

No. The remainers in this place keep talking about the damage of uncertainty when they try to argue against enacting the will of Welsh voters over Brexit, but then they’re happy to leave the issue of business rates uncertain and ill-defined. A country-wide set of hard and fast rules is required, despite Labour’s occasional whim to let businesses off business rates on the odd occasion. I note there’s no mention in Labour’s amendments of restructuring or reviewing business rates to make them more equitable.

Looking around the high streets in north Wales—high streets that were bustling, thriving centres of the community within my lifetime—they’re now full of empty shops. You can practically see the tumbleweed rolling down the high street. In areas of my region, traders have been prevented from loading at the front and rear of their properties. Perhaps the Welsh Government would get the relevant council to propose a solution to how traders load their stock into their shops if they can’t get near it with a delivery van. Parking in the multistorey car park down the road is hardly appropriate.

Things like this explain why, overall, Wales has the highest national vacancy rate on the high street compared with England and Scotland. Fifteen per cent of shops and leisure premises were standing empty at the end of the first half of 2015 and I’m guessing the situation isn’t any better. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: some of the decisions made by local authorities, such as pedestrianisation, parking regulations and charges, scrapping loading bays, increasing business rates, et cetera, are destroying our high streets and the small businesses that used to trade from there. It also shows that the people making the relevant decisions have never tried to run a small business and have no clue what issues those trying to run small businesses face.

It serves no one—not the Welsh Government, not the UK Exchequer, not the local authority, and certainly not the business owner and their employees—to make doing business in Wales more expensive, which is what our current regime of business rates does. I therefore urge the Welsh Government to urgently conduct a review on the restructuring of business rates, so that Welsh Government and local government stop killing the golden goose of small business. Thank you.

I call on the leader of the house, Jane Hutt.

Well, I do welcome the opportunity to respond to this debate and it is an important time for policy development with regard to non-domestic rates. I do recognise the experience that we’ve got here in this Chamber as well as the policy views that have been expressed today.

Non-domestic rates contribute more than £1 billion a year to fund vital local services in Wales and all the rates revenue collected in Wales is redistributed in full to local authorities and police and crime commissioners here in Wales to support these services. We pay taxes because we all get the collective benefits of doing so. The local services that non-domestic rates support are absolutely the ones that businesses need in order to be successful. To maintain these services, it’s right that everyone who is able to contributes their fair share.

Non-domestic rates apply to most forms of non-domestic property, including car parks and out-of-town retail parks. They don’t just apply to businesses. They apply to property occupied by the public sector, of course, and not-for-profit organisations. The rates system was specifically designed to be a tax on property to raise revenue for local services. It’s not a tax on turnover or profit; these are subject to other forms of taxation levied by the UK Government and used for other purposes.

Nick Ramsay has reminded us that the valuation of property is carried out by the Valuation Office Agency. The VOA is independent of the Welsh Government. It determines the methodology for valuing property and applies the same methodology across the country, taking account of local property market conditions.

The Welsh Government recognises that not all rate payers have the same capacity to pay, particularly small businesses, where the rates can represent a higher proportion of their overall costs. That’s why we are providing over £200 million of financial assistance as rates relief in this financial year, 2017-18, and this is supporting more than three quarters of all rate payers. Over £100 million for a small business rates relief scheme already supports almost 70 per cent of businesses in Wales, and over half of all eligible businesses pay no rates at all. This scheme was due to end on 31 March of this year, but we’ve extended it for 2017-18. Without this support, small businesses in Wales would be facing higher tax bills.

We’ve also made it a clear commitment to put a new, permanent, small business rates relief scheme in place from April 2018. As has been said and acknowledged today in this Chamber—and why it’s so topical, of course—we’re currently consulting on proposals for this new relief scheme, with the consultation closing later this week. I’m sure those submissions—I’m sure we’ve seen them from our constituencies and businesses and bodies, leading up to the close of that consultation.

This consultation is important. It seeks views on how the relief could be better targeted to support those businesses that would benefit most and those that would contribute more to the growth of the Welsh economy and the sustainability of our communities. The consultation also considers how the permanent scheme could be developed to support wider Welsh Government objectives. So, it explores, for example, the option of providing additional relief to certain industries or sectors, such as childcare. There needs to, of course, be a robust evidence base for us to consider those options.

This permanent relief scheme will provide certainty and security for small businesses, delivering a tax cut and helping them to drive long-term economic growth for Wales. The introduction of a permanent small business rates relief scheme that is tailored to the specific needs of Wales clearly demonstrates the importance we place on supporting small businesses by reducing their non-domestic rates liability.

Whilst the overall rateable value in Wales has fallen, I recognise that values have risen in some locations and for some types of property. So, in response to the 2017 revaluation, the Welsh Government established a new £10 million transitional relief scheme to assist small businesses whose entitlement to small business rates relief was adversely affected. This relief scheme provides additional support to more than 7,000 ratepayers, and the scheme is fully funded by the Welsh Government. In contrast, transitional relief in England is being funded by ratepayers who saw reductions in their rateable values as a result of the revaluation. Just to be clear, the relief for those whose values have increased is being paid for by those whose bills should have fallen.

We’ve listened to what small businesses have been telling us, especially high-street retailers. Of course, some of us have been representing constituents who’ve been particularly affected by this, and we appreciate that some towns and communities were affected more by the revaluation. While there are many high streets across the country where rates have fallen, some retailers need additional support more generally—these points have been made this afternoon—because of, for example, competition from the growth of online and out-of-town shopping. That’s why we allocated an extra £10 million for additional support for high-street retailers, including shops, cafes and pubs in 2017-18. Again, this is fully funded by the Welsh Government. For many ratepayers, particularly those previously only eligible for partial small business rates relief, this additional relief has reduced their remaining liability to nil.

FSB Wales has welcomed the Welsh Government’s commitment to easing the pressure on high-street businesses affected by the revaluation and thus is a reflection again of the importance of engaging with FSB to learn and to debate these issues. I think it’s useful to highlight ways in which we are supporting our small and medium-sized businesses across Wales, particularly in terms of the high street and those opportunities. Launched in October 2012, the microbusiness loan provides scope, for example, to support businesses with loans of between £1,000 and £20,000. To date, the Wales microbusiness loan fund has supported 371 businesses, investing £9 million directly and attracting over £7.8 million of further private sector funds. The fund has created and safeguarded 1,747 jobs to the end of March 2017. Sometimes, statistics are useful, Nick Ramsay, in terms of just highlighting what has been achieved. Importantly in terms of regeneration, we’ve also funded 20 town-centre partnerships across Wales, and in addition to this, a £20 million town-centre loans fund.

I thank you for giving way, Minister. I recognise that there has been a level of support, over and above what was promised last year, and we do welcome that. But there are other businesses that have fallen through the net, besides those you’ve mentioned, so could your Welsh Government look again at the schemes in place?

Well, I think this is why it’s so important that the response to this debate today and the response to the consultation is fully taken up, and I think it’s also important to remember that—. I want to comment on the car parking scheme—of course, that was your amendment 6—but also the fact that, as you said, funding has been allocated to support pilot initiatives to test the feasibility and impact of free car parking, and that’s intended to support the regeneration of our towns and cities.

The Llywydd took the Chair.

So, finally, in the longer term, we’ll be exploring whether more fundamental changes to the non-domestic rates system could benefit local services and the Welsh economy. I’m sure Adam Price will have welcomed the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government’s update on his plans yesterday, where we’re looking in more detail at alternative approaches to non-domestic property taxation. We have to look at the best examples of taxation systems from across the world, including different forms of taxation. And, of course, in considering those reforms, our priorities have to be greater resilience for local authorities, fairness for citizens, and sustainable funding for vital local services. So, an important time: development on policy on rates relief for small business. We look forward to seeing the responses to our consultation, and I do commend to the Assembly the Government’s amendment to this motion. Diolch.

I call on Neil Hamilton to reply to the debate.

Diolch yn fawr iawn, Llywydd. Well, I’m grateful to those who’ve taken part in this debate today, and UKIP seems to have achieved something that people don’t normally associate with us: the ability to bring about consensus and unity, at least on the non-Government side of the house. I find myself in a position where I could have voted, actually, for the Conservative amendment or for the Plaid amendment, but for the fact that that would involve deleting part of our own motion. I think this has been, well, one of many debates that I’ve lived through in the course of my political lifetime—it is a hardy perennial—but, nevertheless, the importance of it never goes away, and that has been amply demonstrated by the speeches that were made, from Caroline Jones at the start of the debate, right up until the leader of the house speaking. Adam Price’s impassioned rhetoric is always an advantage to have on one’s side, and he pointed out what is the fundamental flaw in property taxes, that it’s anachronistic and, in this particular instance, goes back to the Poor Law of 1601. Land is an easy thing to tax because it’s fixed and can’t be hidden, and it’s a convenient tax for tax collectors, but that’s not normally the best argument that you can make for having a tax. We’ve heard from everybody else the damage that this tax does to the most vibrant businesses in the land, and how it has a chilling effect upon the economy. Caroline Jones pointed out in her opening speech that one in eight retail units in Wales lies empty. It’s unfair and regressive. We’ve heard the Cabinet Secretary for finance, in the course of the last few weeks, talking about the budget and the new taxes that we’re going to get very shortly, and refer to how glad he is to be able to make them progressive. But, of course, in the case of business rates, it’s the opposite. I can’t understand why the desire for progressivity is so great in other taxes that the Welsh Government has control over, but is wholly absent, as Adam Price pointed out, in the case of business rates.

Now, I realise that the Government wants to advertise what it’s done to relieve the problems caused by the current system, and we acknowledge that. Their proposals are welcome—both the temporary ones and the proposal to have a more permanent form of relief—but that doesn’t go to the heart of the problem. What we should have is a kind of all-party commission to try to form a consensus view on how to get rid of this ancient tax, which is doing so much damage. I’ve lived through many property revaluations in the course of my lifetime—some of them far more dramatic than the one we’ve just been experiencing here in Wales—and I’ve lived through disastrous attempts to reform property tax systems, not least the poll tax in the 1980s, which occupied too many of my nights, in those days, in the House of Commons. It’s not an easy problem to solve—I fully accept that—but, nevertheless, I think we ought at least to try, and—

Would you take an intervention?

Yes, I will, sure.

Thank you. Would you agree with me that it’s about Governments working together so that, when we do come out of the EU, and the VAT threshold and the rate can be lowered to encourage people to invest in our country, that Governments need to work together on this issue of business rates and VAT? Because, when Gordon Brown did give 5 per cent off, and lowered it from 20 per cent to 15 per cent, the difference that that made to small businesses, I can tell you, was astronomical. People did take on new staff with that, so—.

Well, it is true that all business taxes, actually, are ultimately borne by consumers or other taxpayers than the businesses who are the conduit through which they are paid, because, if a business doesn’t have the money that it’s going to give to the taxing authorities in its own bank account, to spend either on investment within the business or developing its business or, indeed, to transmit to investors in the business by means of dividends, then of course other ways of spending the money are denied, and taxation is always a dead weight on the enterprise economy, although taxation, of course, is inescapable, like death, as we know. But what I—

Will you take a question?

Yes, of course.

Would you acknowledge that, as you’ve referenced earlier on, £210 million so far, plus £20 million, has gone into Welsh non-domestic business rates? In regard to England, less than a third have had such similar rate relief. Would you acknowledge what the Welsh Government has done in that regard, and also the current consultation? And, in regard to the split multiplier, that there seems to be some consensus across on the opposition benches, would you acknowledge that that is a case of subsidising, say, for instance, small businesses, from hard-pressed sectors such as the steel industry?

Well, in the spirit of consensus in which I started my speech, I welcome Rhianon Passmore into my big tent, if that’s not too frightening and gruesome a prospect. But, yes, of course I acknowledge that the Government has applied several bits of sticking plaster to the existing system, but what we want is not sticking-plaster solutions. We want, for the longer term, at any rate, a solution that is going to deal with the fundamental flaws of this property-based system, which has long outlived its usefulness. The economy is very different from what it was in the early seventeenth century, and we have other forms of taxation that are related to ability to pay, and that is the road down which we should go if we want the Welsh economy to be revived. I keep saying this—that we’re at the bottom of the income scale for the nations and regions of the United Kingdom. If we want to change that, we’ve got to have more radical solutions here in Wales. Wales has always been a radical country, and what I find is so depressing and demoralising about this Labour Government is its utter lack of radicalism. Adam Price talked about its modesty. I remember that Margot Asquith said of her husband, Herbert Asquith, who was the Liberal Prime Minister a hundred years ago, his modesty amounts to deformity’ and I think that is true of this Labour Government as well. We need to combine our resources, I think, and try to arrive at a solution to this problem, which isn’t going to perhaps please everybody, but everybody is agreed upon the flaws of the present system, I’m sure even Labour Members—although I’m disappointed that not a single one of them has participated in this debate this afternoon. Everybody agrees that the system is flawed and everybody agrees on what the nature of those flaws are. But, nevertheless, nobody seems to think that there is a solution; it’s all too difficult. Well, Governments very often create difficulties. They’re not so good at solving them, but I do believe that, with a will, and goodwill, we can achieve this.

So, I’m grateful to everybody who has taken part in this debate today and the spirit in which they’ve made their speeches—Nick Ramsay, Adam Price and Michelle Brown—and there were even parts of the leader of the house’s speech with which I could agree. But my principal point is that, whatever good the Government has done, we do need to have a much more radical and long-term approach, and I don’t see that coming from this consultation document that is currently ongoing. So, I commend our motion to the house.

The proposal is to agree the motion without amendment. Does any Member object? [Objection.] I will defer voting until voting time.

Voting deferred until voting time.