To ask the Minister of Finance and Personnel whether he plans to provide support for owners of vacant properties where rates are set to increase from April 2015.

I have no plans to provide any further support for owners of non-domestic vacant properties. The policies we have adopted in this part of the UK already reflect the higher rate of vacancies here. The standard rate for empty commercial properties is 50% liability whereas it is 90% in Scotland and 100% in England and Wales. Furthermore, we pioneered the empty retail premises relief which affords 50% relief for the first year to new occupiers of long term empty premises and which so far has helped 19 new ventures in the Coleraine area get established.

Furthermore, the £30 million scheme introduced by the Executive to help manage the convergence of district rates will be automatically applied to all domestic and non-domestic properties, occupied or vacant, via a discount to their district rate. The only exclusions from the scheme will be in respect of public sector bodies and those properties which are already converged through social sector standardisation.