The Government has announced plans to trial the rollout of broadband by utilising existing water pipes to install fibre optic cables. This new scheme could support the £5 billion Project Gigabit plan to level up broadband access in hard-to-reach areas as well as the £1 billion Shared Rural Network, which aims to create reliable 4G phone signals to many of the most isolated parts of the country....
This article by Jeremy Moody first appeared in the CAAV e-Briefing of 29th July 2021 Understanding risks is a key part of making a market work. A buyer wants to know exactly what is being bought; the seller wants to contain the risks in that. Market pressures, contract law, consumer protection and other interventions seek to help with means, like the Land Registry, to authenticate major assets. Environmental agreements, including biodiversity gain, have risks as much as any other transaction....
Clay tablets can last longer than parchment, papyrus and paper, keeping records of contracts, debts and now of the sale of part of a field in central Iraq four millennia ago. Dr Daniel Mansfield of the University of New South Wales has shown that, with the legal details, the Old Babylonian tablet Si.427 records the right angled triangles used to measure the areas and give more exact rectangles than in earlier tablet to get the boundaries right, towards 1900BC and over a thousand years before...
This article by Jeremy Moody first appeared in the CAAV e-Briefing of 29th July 2021. The further easing of pandemic restrictions enabled by widespread vaccination and past infections opens up thoughts of how the personal and social side of professional life, business and fellowship might resume. We are looking at what the new balance might be that, across the range of ways we work, combines efficient professional support and the social interaction of a wider life. While judging risk, there is...
The Government has updated its COVID-19 and renting: guidance for landlords, tenants and local authorities to reflect the move to Step 4 on 19 July.
The Government has updated the Coronavirus (COVID-19): compulsory purchase guidance for acquiring authorities to reflect the move to Step 4 of the roadmap.
This article by Jeremy Moody first appeared in the CAAV e-Briefing of 22nd July 2021. The Government in London is clearing desks before Parliament goes into Recess tonight. Tuesday saw statements on planning policy for housing in England, one of the most significant controversies for the coming months. The bones of the policy set out in August 2020’s White Paper are for: 300,000 houses a year, allocated where house price/local earnings ratios show demand councils to identify growth...
The Scottish Government has announced an increase to the funding that will be available for the 2021/22 period for the area based Home Energy Efficiency Programmes. Area Based Schemes are delivered by local authorities targeting fuel poor areas and communities. Funding also targets the 'hardest to treat' properties which require external wall or complex cavity wall insulation, making homes warmer and less expensive to heat. £64 million - an increase of £9 million on last year - will be made...
DEFRA has released the latest list of Countryside Stewardship options that are available on land that has been designated by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) as conditionally exempt from Inheritance Tax (IHT) or as the object of a Maintenance Fund. Options may be excluded to avoid the issue of double funding: for example, where it is already a requirement of IHT Heritage Relief to maintain historic parkland, funding for the same activities will not be available through Countryside Stewardship....
A Tamworth potato processor has been fined £6,500 for a pollution incident killing over 450 fish. The company pleaded guilty to an offence under the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations, 2010. A total financial penalty of £21,264 was imposed on the company which included a contribution to prosecution costs of £10,000. The pollution resulted from a split pipe pumping into the lagoon, and a crude attempt had been made to repair it. This was discharging into a ditch then...
This article by Jeremy Moody first appeared in the CAAV e-Briefing of 8th July 2021. Government announcements will see yet more focus not only on mitigating climate change (just now modelled by the Office for Budget Responsibility to cost Government less than its Covid measures) but also on adapting to and preparing for the new conditions. The UK, leaning into the Atlantic at median latitudes, appears better buffered from extreme change than many parts of the world but that is relative. The...
On 6th July, The Welsh Minister for Climate Change, Julie James, set out an “ambitious three-pronged approach” to address the impact of second home ownership on Wales’ communities. The three-pronged approach will focus on: support - addressing affordability and availability of housing,regulatory framework and system - covering planning law and the introduction of a statutory registration scheme for holiday accommodation; anda fairer contribution - using national and local taxation...
This article by Jeremy Moody first appeared in the CAAV e-Briefing of 1st July 2021. Seven months after the Agriculture Act and England’s Agricultural Transition Plan with its new schemes, DEFRA has published its approach to payments for environmental land management above the regulatory baseline. The Welsh Government has talked of payments appropriate for the value of environmental services achieved. Both have high ambitions to achieve real environmental improvement, knowing that needs a new...
DEFRA is running three webinars to talk through its proposals in the lump sum exit scheme and delinking consultation with the opportunity to ask questions. The links to each webinar are: Tuesday 6th July 15:00-16:00 - https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/defra-lump-sum-exit-scheme-delinking-consultation-webinar-tickets-160972076815 Wednesday 7th July 16:00-17:00 - https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/defra-lump-sum-exit-scheme-delinking-consultation-webinar-tickets-161202572233 Thursday 8th...
This article by Jeremy Moody first appeared in the CAAV e-Briefing of 24th June 2021. In the more agricultural world of two hundred years ago, the economist David Ricardo summarised pricing in a market economy: “Corn is not high because rent is paid, but rent is paid because corn is high.” The price of corn rises with the demand for it since, in Adam Smith’s phrase of forty years earlier, “Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production”. Production has no value unless...
DEFRA has just announced that the deadline for requesting a Countryside Stewardship Mid-Tier Application Pack online is now extended to 16th July.
MHCLG has today advised that while the Code of Practice for commercial property relationships during the COVID-19 pandemic was due to expire today it is now extended until 25th March 2022 but with a commitment to review it before then. The Government is working on the new measures it announced last week, including an arbitration system, and hopes to announce its conclusions in due course....
The period for temporary arrangements for right to rent checks during COVID-19 has been further extended to 31 August 2021. Our Web note 14 May 2021 provides further information.
HS2 has published proposals for the Western Leg (Phase 2b), which will run between Crewe and Manchester with a connection to the West Coast Main Line (WCML)
This article by Jeremy Moody first appeared in the CAAV e-Briefing of 17th June 2021. The completion of the tenancy legislation for England under the Agriculture Act 2020 has prompted a new edition of the CAAV’s Schedule of Time Limits for Valuers and a moment for reflection before it goes to members with the News Letter, the Agricultural Tenancies Update and Value to an Incoming Tenant. There is continuity. With statutory tenancy regimes, previous Schedules have long aided members since...