Rates are leviable on persons and not on property; but they are leviable only on persons occupying lands or buildings within the area rated or owning tithe rentcharge charged on such lands and buildings or enjoying rights of sporting or fishing in connection therewith. The short description of such persons is "the rate payers," and the short description of such lands and buildings is "rateable hereditaments" or, more simply, "hereditaments." In order that the total amount of the rate levied by the rating authority may be fairly apportioned among and assessed upon the several ratepayers in the rating area, Parliament has imposed upon the rating authority the duty of preparing periodically a statement, called a "valuation list," in which each rateable here ditament in the rating area is shortly described, a "rateable value" is assigned to it, and the name of its occupier stated.
It is the duty, enforceable by penalty, of every occupier (and, in certain cases, of every owner or lessee) to assist the rating authority by furnishing such particulars relating to the heredita ment as may be reasonably required for the purpose of ascertain ing its rateable value. With the help of such particulars, and in the light of their own local knowledge and experience, supple mented, if need be, by paid professional advice, the rating author ity decide the rateable value to be assigned to the hereditament. The entries made by the rating authority in the list are liable to revision by a separate authority called the assessment committee, which must, subject to certain conditions, hear any person or body aggrieved by any entry in or omission from the list. There is, also subject to conditions, a right of appeal from the assessment com mittee to the local Court of Quarter Sessions and, ultimately, on points of law, to the Superior Courts. In certain cases, matters in dispute may be dealt with by arbitration. The task of promoting by conference, and otherwise, uniformity of valuation throughout the several rating and assessment areas in each administrative county is entrusted to a county valuation committee representa tive of the various parts of the county.
The outline of the system of valuation for rating purposes given in the six preceding paragraphs relates, as from April 1929 to the whole of England and Wales except London. In London an analogous but not identical system is in force.
The various kinds of rateable hereditaments are described in column I of the following table (Table C). Column 2 shows, according to a summary of estimates made by the rating authori ties, the percentage of the total amount of rates levied in England and Wales in the year 1927-8 which was levied upon the rate payers in respect of each of those kinds of property: When a rating authority has decided upon the amount to be raised by a rate, it brings that amount into comparison with the total rateable value of all the hereditaments in the rating area and, by means of this comparison (after appropriate adjustments, e.g., in respect of amounts which cannot in fact be collected),
estimates the amount which a rate of one penny per pound of the total rateable value of those hereditaments will produce. The total amount to be levied by means of the rate is then divided by the estimated produce of the penny rate, giving, as the quotient, the amount per pound of rateable value of the rate. The rateable value of a hereditament multiplied by this amount per pound (commonly called "the rate in the £") gives the amount payable by the ratepayer. That amount is in due form demanded, usually for a rating period of six months, from him by the rating author ity, and thereupon becomes payable by him. In order to reduce the cost of collecting the rates, owners of property may in certain cases be required by the rating authority to pay to it rates other wise payable by their tenants.
The average amount, per pound of the annual assessable value of all the rateable property in England and Wales, of all the rates collected therein, varied between I's. 84d. and 12s. a year in the period of five years from 1923-4 to 1927-8. These amounts in the are equivalent to L3 13s. 3d. and £4 5s. respec tively per head of the population of the country. The variation in the several localities from these national averages is very great. Thus, in 1927-8, the extreme range in the urban rating areas was from 7s. 6d. in the in a seaside pleasure resort to 34s. 4d. in the £ in a coal-mining area. In rural rating areas the range was similar but on a somewhat lower level.
The congeries of systems, outlined in the preceding paragraphs, which together constitute the local taxation system of England and Wales, have been evolved in the course of centuries; the sev eral parts of the system, and the system as a whole, are the outcome of many local customs, experiments, adjustments, con flicts and compromises—all ultimately expressed in general or local acts of Parliament or in votes of Parliament providing for grants from national taxation.