[2024] UKUT 264 (LC)

The appellant, Mr Kevin Prosser KC, is the head of Pump Court Tax Chambers (“Chambers”), a successful set of barristers’ chambers with premises at 15-17 Bedford Row, London WC1R (“Bedford Row”). At the material time members of Chambers also occupied an annex on two floors of a neighbouring building in Jockey’s Fields. With effect from 1 April 2017 the Jockey’s Fields premises were entered as a single hereditament in the local non-domestic rating list with a rateable value of £152,000. The appellant proposed that the list be altered to split the entry and show each of the rooms occupied by individual barristers as a separate hereditament. The respondent Valuation Officer did not support the proposed alteration and, in a decision handed down on 26 April 2023, the President of the Valuation Tribunal for England, Mr Gary Garland, agreed with the Valuation Officer that the premises should remain as one hereditament. The appellant now appeals against that decision.

As the practice of barristers grouping together to occupy sets of chambers is not a recent one, it might have been expected that any question about the manner in which their occupation should be rated would long since have been resolved. But we have been shown no authority dealing specifically with this form of occupation and the issue appears to be a novel one. Its emergence follows the introduction of the current regime of small business rate relief by the Non-Domestic Rating (Reliefs, Thresholds and Amendment) (England) Order 2017, one consequence of which is that a ratepayer occupying only one hereditament the rateable value of which is not more than £12,000 will receive a 100% reduction in their rates bill. That provides an incentive to split a larger hereditament into smaller units where the characteristics of the premises permit it.

At the hearing of the appeal Nicholas TrompeterKC appeared for the appellant and Paul Reynolds appeared for the respondent. We are grateful to them both for their submissions.