Questions Without Notice from the Party Leaders

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 2:00 pm on 2 February 2021.

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Photo of Mark Drakeford Mark Drakeford Labour 2:00, 2 February 2021

Well, I thank the Member for that question and I look forward to going on discussing these matters with him, because they are genuinely serious and they're genuinely challenging in a policy sense. I am attracted not just to regular revaluation but rolling revaluation, in which it would be possible to have a register that is kept up to date all the time so that you don't get the distortions that we see when revaluations are postponed over many years. That will require a different relationship with the Valuation Office Agency, and quite possibly a separate valuation system for Wales, where we're not reliant on the current arrangements. 

The Member quotes the figures from the IFS report about what revaluation and other reforms might mean for people at the bottom end of the income scale, but he doesn't quote the fact that, for people at the top end of the property valuations, that could mean thousands of pounds in additional bills every year. And not everybody who lives in a big house, as he knows, is somebody with a big income. So, there will be a need for very considerable transition arrangements to be put in place in order to protect those who would be adversely affected and don't have incomes to fall back on; albeit that they're asset rich, they're cash poor. So, it will be more complicated than headlines that say that some parts of Wales will be better off, because the system will have to be navigated through in a way that is fair to everybody, and it will not be as simple, I'm afraid, as some of the slogans will suggest.