Legal background Section 1 - Regional rates
Article 6 of the Rates (Northern Ireland) Order 1977 requires a regional rate to be set for each rating year by the Department of Finance. Pursuant to Article 7 of that Order, it must be set by an order made by the department and subject to affirmative resolution in the Assembly. This was not possible in the absence of a sitting Assembly so the rate was therefore set by this Act. The rate was set for 2017-18 by the Northern Ireland (Ministerial Appointments and Regional Rates) Act 2017. As in that Act, the setting of the regional rate by this Act was without prejudice to the department’s powers to vary it by order in the usual way (see section 1(4)).