We moved from southeast London to Norwich in late 2012 with the dream of building a home for our family that would require as little energy as possible to run and that would use materials with the minimum possible impact on the environment. Late May 2013 and the journey really began as we started the search for a plot to build on.

Saturday 8 February 2014

Community Infrastructure Levy or Not?

I knew that we'd be learning lots of new interesting stuff in the course of designing and building our house but I really hadn't anticipated a crash course in Parliamentary processes and "delegated committees". There's a gaping hole, a big "known unknown", in our budget at the moment (one of many to be honest) optimistically labelled as "Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) Exemption ?". It looks as though next week could give us a little more certainty and hopefully some comfort that we will be exempt from the £75/m2 tax.

There's been talk of exemption for "genuine" self-builders from CIL since the Government put plans to amend the CIL out to consultation back in Spring 2013. There's been very little concrete information however and, faced with a potential make or break decision, we decided to find out for ourselves just how long we might have to wait for the 2014 amendments (including exemption for self-build projects) to actually come into force.

Our starting point? A good friend who has in the past actually been responsible for drafting legislation. His searches showed that the 2014 Amendments were "laid" (or "tabled") before the House of Commons on the 9th December 2013 and that, while it sat way down on the House's "Future Business" list (See Item 30 of the very last section - Remaining Orders and Notices - on the 10th December) there was a note that "the Instrument has not yet been considered by the Select Committee on Statutory Instruments" (SCSI)

So we wrote to them to find out when they would be considering them! We made contact with the Acting Clerk of the committee, a guy called Simon Patrick, who has been the most amazingly helpful person and who has been keeping us informed of the progress of the amended CIL regulations as they pass through the mechanisms of parliament.

Here's the process in a nutshell (with translations my me) with key dates shown:

  • The original draft CIL amendments were withdrawn on 20th January but "laid" again on the same day as a "paper subject to affirmative resolution" - i.e. one requiring the House's approval. They probably found a mistake and had to alter the draft slightly.
  • The new draft regulations were considered by the SCSI on 29th January and the committee "decided not to draw the House's special attention to them". This means that committee decided that there was nothing wrong with the draft regulations from a drafting point of view - it doesn't examine the merits of the draft regulations.
  • To save time on the floor of the House, most affirmative instruments (those requiring the House's approval) are debated in a "Delegated Legislation Committee" for up to 1 1/2 hours. The next day (usually) a motion to approve the draft regulations will be moved on the floor of the House, for decision without any further debate. If any Member calls for a vote, this may be deferred till the following Wednesday. When the House has approved the draft, the Government can make the actual regulations.
  • We now know that the Delegated Legislation Committee will meet on Monday 10th February at 4.30 pm to consider the draft CIL Regulations.
  • So we're expecting a motion to approve the regulations to appear on the House's Order Paper for Tuesday 11th February.
  • If the motion is objected to for any reason, there would be a "deferred division (a vote using voting papers)" on Wednesday 12th.
We may be taking a close interest in Parliament TV on Tuesday as this will have a significant impact on our budget.

2 comments:

  1. Hi, we are in the same position as you awaiting the implementation of the new regs. Do you know what the outcome was? We cannot find any more info on the matter which is so fustrating.

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    1. Hi Angela. The 2014 Draft Amendments, including the self-build exemption, were approved by the House of Commons on Tuesday evening (http://www.theyworkforyou.com/debates/?id=2014-02-11a.820.2) without any opposition. My understanding is that this now means that the amended regulations will now come into force - but I'm still trying to get a clear indication of when this will actually happen! You'll see my frustration if you follow us on Twitter! (www.twitter.com/zerocarbonbods). I have a contact at Dept for Communities and Local Govt (although they are up to their necks in flood crisis management at the moment) and have also written to our local planners to see what their take is on the likely timescale. I will keep posting on this blog and on Twitter with any news. PS - we might set up a Facebook page for our project soon too. Andy

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