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Northern Ireland business rates statistic is twice the OBR NI line: regional vs district rates

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@MaxGhenis is already working on this.

Since Oct 11, 2026.

  • #2344 by @MaxGhenis — open

Assessment

Difficulty
2/5
Estimated time
1-3 hours
Newbie friendliness
72/100
Issue type
Documentation
Clarity
Clearly specified
Activity status
Active
Tech stack
python, yaml
Domain
data, documentation

Research direction

Start with statistics.yaml, yoy_growth.yaml, and the business_rates partition note mentioned in the issue. Read the Northern Ireland business rates entries alongside the source comparison in the issue, then document that the statistic includes both regional and district rates while the OBR index covers the regional rate. Done when all three locations explain the level used and the assumption in applying the OBR index.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Description

gov.hmrc.business_rates.statistics.revenue.NORTHERN_IRELAND (added in #2322) is Land & Property Services' non-domestic rates paid: £741.3m in 2024-25. It is projected with the OBR's "Northern Ireland business rates" line (March 2026 EFO, receipts Table 3.2): £382.3m in 2024-25. The statistic is 1.94 times the line, and #2322's partition note records the gap without explaining it.

What the sources show

  • The gap is the district rate. An NI rate bill is the regional rate (made by the Department of Finance) plus the council's district rate, levied "as if they were items of a single rate" (Rates (Northern Ireland) Order 1977, art 9(1)). LPS counts both; the OBR line covers the regional rate only.
  • Poundage split, 2024-25 (computed). Each council's LPS payments split by its regional (29.02p) and district (25.57p to 38.22p) non-domestic poundages give a regional part of £363.7m (95% of the OBR line) and a district part of £377.7m.
  • ONS records the two separately. Country and regional public sector finances, financial year ending 2025 (26 May 2026), shows "Northern Ireland Regional Non-Domestic Rates" (£327m, central government) and "Northern Ireland District Non-Domestic Rates" (£378m, local government).
  • DoF. Regional rate income is "forecasted to generate just over £900m" in 2026-27 (NI Assembly written statement, 12 February 2026). The OBR's NI domestic and business lines sum to £913.7m in 2026-27.
  • Cash vs accrual explains at most about 5% in normal years: LPS £741m against ONS £705m in 2024-25.

Proposed

  • Keep the level (regional plus district). It matches domestic_rates, which charges the full NI bill, and the GB series, which count every non-domestic rate paid.
  • Keep the OBR NI index. It is the only official forecast. Applying it to the district part is an assumption to state. Enacted 2026-27 poundages would add £10.7m (1.4%) to 2026-27.
  • Document both in statistics.yaml, yoy_growth.yaml and the business_rates partition note.
Dominant language
Python
Stars
50
Forks
34
Avg merge
2d 12h
Merged PRs (30d)
154

Getting set up

First steps

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  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

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