General Rates Act 1967–Unoccupied property rate–Appeal against grant of distress warrant by magistrates–Whether altered valuation ineffective because valuation officer’s proposals never reached owners–Owing to transfers of ownership and moves notice of proposals sent to address which owners had left–Forwarding arrangements either not carried out or unsatisfactory–No objections having been received new rateable values entered on list–Effect of sections 87 and 67(6) and (7) of General Rate Act–Rating authority obliged to collect rates on basis of list in force–Valuation as altered in list conclusive evidence of value–Appeal dismissed
This was an
appeal by case stated from a decision of the Willesden magistrates granting a
distress warrant for unpaid unoccupied property rate on Morris House, Cowley
Road, London W3, a property owned by the appellants, County and Nimbus Estates
Ltd.
Lord Colville
of Culross QC (instructed by D J Freeman & Co) appeared on behalf of the
appellants; C Fay (instructed by the Chief Solicitor, London Borough of Ealing)
represented the respondents.
Giving the
first judgment at the invitation of Lord Widgery CJ, DRAKE J said: This is an
appeal by way of case stated from a decision of the Willesden Justices given on
September 16 1976. On that date a complaint made by the London Borough of
Ealing as the local rating authority alleging that the appellant company had
failed to pay the unoccupied property rate in respect of premises known as Morris
House, Cowley Road, London W3, was found to be good, and the justices granted a
distress warrant in the sum of £59,124.73. The appellant company contended that
the sum demanded was excessive because the true rateable value for the premises
in question was lower than that shown in the valuation list on which the rating
authority had based its demands.
In brief, in
circumstances to which I will refer in more detail in a moment, the rateable
value of the premises as shown in the valuation list had been amended with
effect from December 21 1973 as a result of proposals made by the valuation
officer on February 4 1974. The appellants say that the notice of such
proposals was never validly served by the valuation officer in the manner
required by the General Rate Act 1967 and accordingly the increased rateable
valuation as shown in the valuation list was ineffective and invalid. They
contend that the true and only valid valuation remained the lower one formerly
in effect, and that they are liable only to pay rates calculated by reference
to this lower figure.
The facts as
found by the justices and recited in the case stated may be summarised as
follows. In November 1973 the then owners of the property negotiated to sell
the premises to a company called Nimbus Estates Ltd, which are to be
distinguished from the appellant company, who are County and Nimbus Estates
Ltd. The valuation officer for the area was informed by letters from the
vendors’ solicitors and from the proposed purchasers, Nimbus Estates Ltd that Nimbus
Estates Ltd were buying the property. The letter from Nimbus Estates Ltd
included in its heading the words ‘Reply to 7/7a Station Road, Finchley, N3
2SB.’ The sale was completed on December
21 1973, but at the direction of Nimbus Estates Ltd the property was in fact
not purchased by them but was conveyed to another company called Freemanco (No
2) Ltd, which subsequently changed its name to the appellant company now named
County and Nimbus Estates Ltd. Also subsequently to that conveyance Nimbus
Estates Ltd changed its name to Nimbus Securities Ltd. No one informed the
valuation officer of those matters, and so far as he was aware the purchaser
had been Nimbus Estates Ltd, who had an address 7/7a, Station Road, Finchley,
to which he had been requested to address any reply to the original letter
received from that company.
The premises
were then, subsequent to the conveyance, altered or enlarged or rebuilt, and
the valuation officer on February 4 1974 made proposals to subdivide the
premises from two rateable properties into four rateable properties. The effect
of that as well was to increase quite considerably the total rateable value of
the premises. He, the valuation officer, having assumed that the purchaser of
the premises had been Nimbus Estates Ltd, proceeded to send his notice of
proposals to the address 7/7a Station Road, Finchloy, assuming no doubt that
that was the registered office of Nimbus Estates Ltd. In fact that address was
not the registered office of Nimbus Estates Ltd, and additionally Nimbus
Estates Ltd had moved away from whatever activities they had carried on at any
time at those premises and gone to some other address, and apparently the
arrangements for forwarding mail were not fully carried out or satisfactory.
The result of that was that the valuation officer’s proposals never reached the
appellants, who were in fact the owners of the property.
The valuation
officer, not receiving any objections to his proposals for the obvious reason
that the appellants had not received them, in those circumstances made his new
valuations effective by directing the rating authority to enter them on the
valuation list. The rating officer carried out that direction, and so the
increased and new rateable values were duly entered on the list. At a later
date when rate demands were received by the appellants on May 14 1975 based on
the altered valuations, the appellants contended that the new valuations had
not been made in the manner required by the General Rate Act 1967, the
proposals not having been served on them or in the manner required by section
109 of the Act. Accordingly, the appellants say, the altered valuation was
wholly ineffective.
The matter
having come before the magistrates on a complaint by the rating authority
asking that a distress warrant should be levied, the appellants then raised
these arguments saying that because the proposals of the valuation officer had
not been served in accordance with the Act the new valuation
due under the altered valuation. The response of the rating authority to that
was, and is in the arguments we have had addressed to us today in this court,
in short, that the effect of section 87 of the General Rate Act 1967 and
section 67(6) and (7) of that Act is to make the valuation as shown in the
valuation list conclusive, and that the rating authority should not, and have
no power to, go behind the valuation as shown in the list and to enquire into
how the altered valuation got there and matters of that nature.
Section 87 of
the Act reads as follows:
The rating
authority shall give effect to any directions which may from time to time be
given to them by the valuation officer in pursuance of any provision of this
Act authorising or requiring the valuation officer to cause or direct
alterations to be made in a valuation list.
Section 67(6)
reads as follows:
Subject to
subsection (7) of this section, the valuation list in accordance with which,
under section 2(4)(b) of this Act, any rate falls or fell to be made, as in
force (or about to come into force) at the date of the making of the rate,
shall be conclusive evidence for the purposes of the levying of that rate of
the values of the several hereditaments included in the list.
Subsection (7)
deals with the case in which an alteration of the valuation list is made by
providing as follows:
As respects
any period during which, under this Act, an alteration of the valuation list
referred to in subsection (6) of this section is for the time being to be
treated as having had effect, the reference in the said subsection (6) to that
list shall be construed as a reference to that list as so altered.
The effect of
those sections, it is contended by the rating authority, and in my judgment
rightly contended, is as follows. The rating authority are put under a
mandatory duty by the provisions of this Act to collect rates on the basis of
the valuation list in force, and, where an alteration is being made to that
list, on the basis of the valuation as altered. Under subsections (6) and (7)
of section 67 the valuation as altered shown in the valuation list is
conclusive evidence as to its correctness.
Lord Colville
on behalf of the appellants says that, while he must concede that section 87 is
a section which prohibits in effect the rating authority from going behind the
valuation, that does not debar the magistrates who are called upon to issue or
consider the issuing of a distress warrant from going behind the valuation list
to see whether the valuation has been properly entered as a result of valid
steps taken within the procedure laid down by the Act. In my judgment, that is
not a good argument. The magistrates are required to judge the position between
the rating authority and the ratepayer, and Parliament has laid down by section
87 of the Act that there is a duty on the rating authority to give effect to
directions which may from time to time be given to them by the valuation
officer. The effect of that section, coupled with section 67, is, in my judgment,
such as to bind the magistrates also not to go behind the valuation as shown in
the valuation list and to give effect to it, and to issue a distress warrant
where it is shown to them that the ratepayer has been properly summonsed to
appear before the magistrates’ court and the rate demanded is in accordance
with the rate as shown on the valuation list.
In my
judgment, the passage in Ryde on Rating 13th ed at p 861 correctly
states the position when it says:
. . . if the
rate is good on the face of it, and has been duly made and published, and there
is jurisdiction to make a rate on the person charged, the duty of the justices
becomes ministerial.
For these
reasons, in my judgment, the justices were correct in this case in refusing to
inquire into such matters as the validity of the steps taken by the valuation
officer in serving the notice of proposals made by him, and were correct in
granting the distress warrant in the same claim. For those reasons I would dismiss
this appeal.
LORD WIDGERY
CJ and BOREHAM J agreed.
The appeal
was dismissed with costs. Leave to appeal (if it were necessary) was refused.
