Peter Village KC
Year of call: 1983
Silk: 2002
Peter Village QC and Cleon Catsambis are acting for a consortium of firms in a high-profile judicial review challenge against the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government's 2017 business rates revaluation transitional scheme. The proposed scheme concerns the business rate liability of hundreds of thousands of businesses across the country for the period 2017-2022.
The claimant firms allege that Secretary of State's decision to implement the proposed transitional scheme was unlawful and/or irrational and that the underlying consultation process was itself unlawful. The transitional scheme adopted by DCLG artificially inflates the true business rate liability for the claimants, and many others in their position, and prevents them from ever reaching their true liability within the five year period of the scheme. This is in stark contrast to the alternative of a modest across-the-board increase in the multiplier, which DCLG failed to consider and dismissed out of hand.
In particular, the decision is challenged on the following grounds: