The proposals include a nil rate (ie £0 per square metre) on new hospital and care home development, following criticism from local National Health Service employees. Ambulance infrastructure, such as new ambulance stations, are also proposed to be nil-rated.
The council has published its Draft CIL Charging Schedule following a consultation on the Preliminary Draft Charging Schedule from November 2011 to January.
The Council has agreed to reduce CIL for hospitals and care homes, following criticism that the Council's proposed rate of £50 per square metre for "other chargeable development" would adversely impact on the viability of new care homes and hospitals.
The Council agreed to nil-rate care homes and hospitals "to ensure that development that primarily comprises of socially necessary infrastructure in its own right (hospitals, prisons, care homes etc) and is normally provided from public funding, is not required to pay CIL", it said (27-page / 212 KB PDF ).
The council also agreed to move the areas of Easton, Ashley and Lawrence Hill into the "outer zone", so that residential development in those areas would be reduced to £50 per sq m, following a consultation response which highlighted evidence of residential schemes in the Easton, Ashley and Lawrence Hill areas where sales values were significantly less than those set out in the CIL Viability Study. The Council agreed and so reduced the size of the more expensive "inner zone".
“The imposition of a nil rate for all residential and non-residential institutions illustrates the extreme pressures on viability for many forms of development in Bristol,” said Marcus Bate, a planning law expert at Pinsent Masons, the law firm behind Out-Law.com. "This pragmatic approach is consistent with the Council’s earlier decision to impose a nil rate for all commercial uses, despite viability evidence suggesting that a charge of up to £40 per square metre might be viable."
“The change to residential rates for some areas, which have been moved to the 'outer zone', is a rare example of effective, evidence-based representations directly resulting in a Council agreeing to reduce its proposed CIL charges," said Bate. "Too many representations have not been substantiated with evidence or have focused on regulated issued over which the Council has no control. This example should encourage other developers to focus their efforts, resources and arguments during the statutory CIL consultation stages."
The Charging Schedule (6-page / 1.3 MB PDF) proposes a charge of £70 per sq m for residential development in the inner zone and for hotels.
The most expensive development in the city is retail, for which the Council has proposed a charge of £120 per sq m. This is followed by student accommodation, which is charged at £100 per sq m. "Other chargeable development" is still planned to be charged at £50 per sq m.
CIL is a new way of collecting developer contributions to help fund infrastructure projects. It allows local authorities to charge a tariff, at a locally set rate, on many types of new development.
The money can then be used to pay for a wide range of additional infrastructure that is required as a result of development. This can include transport schemes, green infrastructure and community facilities.
