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Rates (Amendment) (Northern Ireland) Order 2006

My Lords, this is not the first order. Other parts of the parliamentary process have been applied to this; it has not been done furtively. I did not make the case; the noble Lord, Lord Glentoran, reminded us that the House of Commons approved the order. The idea that we are proceeding without parliamentary approval is nonsense. There has been more than one order associated with this change to get the process up and running and enable the figures to be produced, for a start. We approved an order in the summer that was tied in with this; it was made abundantly clear then that the next order would be the final piece of the jigsaw. So this is not out on its own, but there is a knock-on effect on water charges. I should like to put these figures on the record just so that there is no misunderstanding. The average level of household taxation in the UK in 2006-07—the total household charge, which is the property charge and the water direct charge—is £1,350 in England; in Wales it is £1,126; in Scotland it is £1,253; and in Northern Ireland it is £668. There is a substantial difference; it is also shown if one takes out the water charge which in England, Wales and Scotland averages £290. The delay in the timing is important. Parliament has not been presented with a fait accompli, and this is not the first piece of the jigsaw. I hope that that point is accepted. The noble Lord, Lord Trimble, asked a question that he had asked in Committee. Like most of these matters, it is not straightforward. Let me give the figures relating to housing benefit. At present, 25 per cent of households—about 180,000—receive help with their rates. Twenty per cent of households receive full support—that is, 100 per cent. About 40,000 households will benefit from the rate relief scheme implied in the order. The rate relief scheme and the housing benefit will benefit about 185,000 households. One problem is that we do not know—in a way, we cannot—the proportion of winners or losers who are on benefits. That information is not available. We can work out the information with regard to houses because we have the figures for house valuations, but it is not correct to state that all or most of the winners will be on benefits. They will not be, as I indicated in the example I gave. There is something else I need to remind the House about, particularly those noble Lords who have declared their interest properly and will be paying more. There is a transitional relief which is not means-tested. It is a three-year process, which means that people will not pay more than a third of the increase in each of the years. The average award will be £178. Some 100,000 people will benefit from the transitional relief in 2007-08. It is not something we are doing willy-nilly. The point about the Lyons inquiry was seductive. Everyone is waiting for the report. Sir Michael Lyons is reviewing the system of local government and local government finance in England. We have reviewed it in Northern Ireland. I fully admit that it was without a democratic mandate, although it started off with one. The options were disclosed and put in for debate by the democratic mandate before the Assembly was suspended. But Northern Ireland has reviewed its system of local government and local government finance. The system in Northern Ireland is pre-poll tax. There is bound to be unfairness in a system that uses 1968 valuations, so Lyons is not relevant to the situation in Northern Ireland. The noble Lord, Lord Glentoran, called this a modern window tax. I think that is a bit unfair. There has been no erosion of civil liberty. The powers of entry were never used. No one has had the inside of their house checked to see how good the decoration is. That is why there is a difference between capital value and market value. We have assumed that every property is in an average state of repair.