Commentary on Provisions Part 5 – Enforcement of the levy and penalties Chapter 2 – Assessments where no return or incorrect return Section 45 – Power to allow a local authority to make or substitute an assessment
85.This section allows the Scottish Ministers to make provision, by regulations subject to the affirmative procedure, for and in connection with a relevant local authority assessing the levy payable by a person (subsection (1)). The relevant local authority may only exercise this power if it has reason to believe that the person liable to pay the levy has not made a return by the date required under section 26(2)(b), or where the local authority is honestly and reasonably of the view that the return is incorrect either because of carelessness or deliberate miscalculation.
86.Subsection (2) lists the matters that regulations may make provision for or in connection with. Regulations may make provision for the conditions that a local authority must be satisfied of before making an assessment of a levy when no return has been made, or where the local authority is of the view that an assessment of a levy in a return is incorrect. In addition, regulations may make provision for the procedure a local authority must follow to make an assessment of the levy payable, the notices that must be given before or after an assessment, time limits for and delegation of the exercise of powers, and the effect of an authority’s assessment on the imposition of penalties under Part 5, Chapter 3.
87.Subsection (3) sets out the matters that regulations must make provision for: reviews of an assessment made by a local authority (and may include the matters mentioned in section 71(2)) and appeals to the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland against an assessment after a review has been conducted (and may include the matters mentioned in section 72(2)).