Meeting of the Parliament 08 March 2016
I will make a couple of observations. First, the Deputy First Minister has outlined that the amendment that he lodged at stage 2 dealt only with the first part of Gavin Brown’s two-pronged problem in that respect. The second problem that Gavin Brown highlighted, which relates to a situation in which the sale collapses because the buyer withdraws, would not be addressed by a 14-day grace period as proposed at stage 2. [Interruption.]
I hear Gavin Brown saying that he proposed a 60-day grace period at stage 2. At committee, we went through the reasons why that was inappropriate. Given the 30-day requirement for the submission of LBTT returns, a 60-day grace period would have raised significant issues. In particular, Gavin Brown’s amendment did not specify any particular sales that would be captured, so it would have covered all transactions and allowed anybody to delay their transaction by 60 days irrespective of whether a sale had been completed or whether they were selling in the first place. It would have given carte blanche for a 60-day grace period simply to apply to all sales, in the same way as the 14-day grace period that Gavin Brown proposed, which did not specify who would be captured by the provision.
Gavin Brown should draw comfort from the fact—and I think that he is supporting the bill at stage 3 for these reasons—that, first, as the Deputy First Minister has highlighted, there will be the possibility of repayment after an 18-month period if a transaction goes through, and secondly, data will be captured to inform the possible future use of order-making powers to make an amendment if that is necessary. On that basis, we should all be grateful that the bill will receive support at decision time.
15:07