The Government recently announced a consultation on giving local councils control of locally collected business rates. I believe that these reforms would be a big step in the right direction, and will play a key role in boosting economic growth across the country. Allowing local councils to retain more of the money which they collect through business rates will provide an incentive to innovate in how they stimulate growth within their local areas.
Rugby is fortunate to have dynamic, and progressive, councils which have positively embraced the need for change in these more challenging times. These reforms will further enable both Rugby Borough and Warwickshire Council to lay the foundations for, and to promote, growth locally and deliver the facilities that residents want.
I ran a business for 25 years in Rugby and throughout that time received an annual bill from Rugby Borough Council for business rates. Like many others, I assumed that this money would be spent locally and I was astonished when I learnt that this was not the case. The money collected as business rates has been collected by local authorities to be transferred to central Government who would then redistribute it to local councils.
When in future our Council will able to keep more of the money they collect, they will be free to use it to make the town more attractive to both residents and prospective businesses. Bringing businesses into the town brings with it employment opportunities and stimulates the wider local economy also which benefits us all.
Currently Parliament is in recess which means that my day to day business as your MP is spent here in Rugby. Over the next month I will be visiting a great number of local organisations and businesses to listen to their concerns and also their hopes for the future. These reforms on local government finance underlines the Government’s commitment to supporting private sector led growth and also to giving more power to local people who I believe are best placed to make the right decisions for their local communities. They will move the country away from Labour’s model of dependency and show how the current Government is getting on with cleaning up the mess the country was left after the years of Blair and Brown.