Business Rate Relief

Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Finance and Trefnydd – in the Senedd at 2:07 pm on 16 October 2019.

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Photo of Suzy Davies Suzy Davies Conservative 2:07, 16 October 2019

It's on that point, actually. In July, you may remember, actually, that you were kind enough to write, or correspond, anyway, with Bridgend County Borough Council about their high street retail rates relief. They finally told me in July—and it was after you'd contacted them—that 90 per cent of businesses that had applied to them for this kind of rate relief had actually been successful, so thank you for contacting them. However, if the measure of success of this policy is the number of high street businesses that have either opened or stayed open, I'm not sure that you can claim success in this particular borough. So, in this review that you're doing and the evaluation of the policy, what are going to be the main criteria for success? Is it going to be the number of businesses that have stayed open, rather than comparisons with England on how many people are paying rates and so forth? And will you be comparing the effects of your particular policy with alternative policies that are being offered here by other parties?