[2025] EWHC 2336 (Ch)

NDR is also payable in respect of unoccupied hereditaments. Section 45 of the 1988 Act provides

“(1)

A person (the ratepayer) shall as regards a hereditament be subject to a non-domestic rate in respect of a chargeable financial year if the following conditions are fulfilled in respect of any day in the year -

(a)

on the day none of the hereditament is occupied,

(b)

on the day the ratepayer is the owner of the whole of the hereditament,

(c)

the hereditament is shown for the day in a local non-domestic rating list in force for the year, and

(d)

on the day the hereditament falls within a class prescribed by the Secretary of State by regulations.”

By Section 65(1) of the 1988 Act, the owner of a hereditament or land is “the person entitled to possession of it”. This provision was considered by the Court of Appeal in Brown v City of London Corporation [1996] 1 WLR 1070 and by the Supreme Court in Rossendale. In Rossendale the court was dealing with, among other things, the application of PAG to strike out the present Wigan claim.

The Secretary of State has prescribed a class for the purposes of s. 45(1)(d) of the 1988 Act by the Non-Domestic Rating (Unoccupied Property) (England) Regulations 2008/386, reg.3 of which provides

“The class of non-domestic hereditaments prescribed for the purposes of section 45(1)(d) of the Act consists of all relevant non-domestic hereditaments other than those described in regulation 4.”

So far as material, reg.4 (k) of the 2008 Regulations provides

“The relevant non-domestic hereditaments described in this regulation are any hereditament … whose owner is a company which is subject to a winding-up order made under the Insolvency Act 1986 or which is being wound up voluntarily under that Act…”

This is the exemption from NDR in respect of property whose owner is a company which is being wound up voluntarily under the Insolvency Act 1986 to which reference was made above.