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Rates bills are stopping truckstop development
Page 6
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Finding secure parking is a desperate problem, and government policy isn't helping. Guy Sheppard and Lucia Cockcroft report.
EXCESSIVE RATES bills are stifling investment in secure overnight truck parking, according to the UK's biggest truck stop operator. Murdo MacDonald, MD of Nightowl. reports that its business rates are up to five times higher than those paid by competitors who simply run cafes with parking attached. For every pound we get for parking, 17.5% goes on VAT and 17.5% goes on rates," he adds. "Out of what's left we have to pay for security guards, fencing, utilities and security systems.
Over the years, police forces from various parts of the country have approached us about putting our type of truckstops into their particular areas but interest falls when we tell them how it is going to be priced."
Nightowl, which briefly went into receivership in 2003, appealed to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister about the rates issue earlier this year.
MacDonald says it was referred to the Valuation Office, the gov ernment agency that assesses business rates. This says business rates are based on the potential rental value of a property. Because secure truckstops have had investment in fencing, security lighting and soon, their rental value, and therefore the business rates, are higher.
A report commissioned by Kent County Council warns that an increasing number of drivers will he pushed into breaking the hours rules or parking illegally unless more truckstops are built in the county (CM 13 October).
But MacDonald points out that land in southern England is very expensive: "Like any other business, you have to make a return on your investment."