Non-domestic rating – Rating list – Alteration of list – Semi-detached house – Signs erected in front window advertising practice of Chinese medicine – Front room partly fitted out for purpose – No business conducted – Property entered in rating list as composite hereditament of “office and premises” – Section 66(1)(a) of Local Government Finance Act 1988 – Whether premises remaining wholly used for purposes of living accommodation – Appeal allowed
The appellant owned a semi-detached house that she had purchased in 1996 with the intention of establishing a practice for Chinese medicine in the ground-floor front room. In 1997, she applied for planning permission for a change of use of part of the ground floor from a dwelling-house to a herb and acupuncture clinic with parking. Although permission was not granted at that time, a council officer advised the appellant to ensure that the medical use retained a low profile and to reapply in 10 years time. The appellant installed a desk and filing boxes and attached signs in the front window advertising her services. She also installed more chairs, a telephone and shelves containing herb storage jars. She did not, however, conduct any business from the premises and continued to use the room for domestic purposes while continuing in full-time employment elsewhere.
A Valuation Office Agency referencer inspected the property in March 2005 following which the respondent valuation officer altered the 2000 rating list to show, with effect from April 2004, a new composite entry for the property as “office and premises” with a rateable value of £1,575. That entry was repeated in the 2005 rating list. The appellant made a proposal to change the entry to show the effective date as January 2006, contending that her practice had not commenced before then. The respondent rejected that proposal and his decision was upheld by the local valuation tribunal.
The appellant appealed. She contended that the premises were, at the relevant time, “used wholly for the purposes of living accommodation” so as to be domestic property within section 66(1)(a) of the Local Government Finance Act 1988, rather than a “composite hereditament” liable to non-domestic rates within section 64(9). She submitted that the limited works undertaken to the front room prior to January 2006, in anticipation of its future medical use, did not take it outside the statutory definition of a domestic property.
Decision: The appeal was allowed.
The appellant’s intention to practice Chinese medicine from the property was not sufficient to constitute occupation for such a purpose. That required some overt act amounting to evidence of such user; the placement of signs in the front window was such an overt act and signalled to the world at large that the property was in use for the purposes of Chinese herbal medicine. The signage and the limited fitting-out of the front room created an impression of business use. However, the signs had been placed there only following advice from an officer of the local planning authority, and the furniture and fittings were not specialised but were equally commensurate with the use of the room as a domestic study. On the evidence, no patients had been treated at the property and the front room had continued to be used for domestic purposes as living accommodation. There was an overt semblance of business occupation but no substance: R v Melladew [1907] 1 KB 192 distinguished. On the evidence, the property had remained wholly in use as living accommodation and was thus domestic property for the purposes of section 66(1)(a) of the 1988 Act between April 2005 and January 2006. The entry should be deleted from the 2005 rating list until the agreed effective date of January 2006.
The appellant and respondent both appeared in person.
Sally Dobson, barrister
