HDR Group Limited v Lucy Formela-Osborne (Valuation Officer)

Facts

The appellant, HDR Group Ltd, a company specialising in the clearance and remediation of contaminated sites, entered into an agreement for lease with Merthyr Tydfil County Borough Council on 29 March 2019 in relation to a former industrial site at Pengarnddu Industrial Estate, Merthyr Tydfil (the Property), which the Council owned. The grant of a three-year lease at a nominal rent was conditional on the appellant securing an environmental permit from Natural Resources Wales. Meanwhile the appellant had a temporary non-exclusive licence to enter from 8 April 2019 to carry out preliminary enabling works. Those works were completed within four to six weeks and the appellant vacated the site on 12 May 2019, not returning until the lease was executed on 22 November 2021. On 12 May 2021 the appellant made a proposal under regulation 4(1)(b) of the Non-Domestic Rating (Alteration of Lists and Appeals) (Wales) Regulations 2005, alleging a material change of circumstances and seeking a reduction in the rateable value in the 2017 list from £46,500 to £23,000. The valuation officer referred it to the Valuation Tribunal for Wales, which dismissed the appeal on 4 August 2025, finding no material change of circumstances. The question of standing was not considered there, it having been assumed that the appellant was entitled to make the proposal. The appellant appealed to the Upper Tribunal, where the valuation officer challenged its standing and the point was taken first as a strike-out application.