A VILLAGE hall secretary has backed calls for volunteers not having to pay VAT bills on improvement work in order to run community facilities.

The National Village Halls Forum, which campaigns on behalf of 10,000 community buildings in rural England, is urging the Government to introduce tax breaks and support for volunteer trustees.

It is asking for the refund of the 20 per cent VAT currently paid on improvement projects.

The forum says a grant aid scheme would allow village hall trustees to carry out these works, which will provide jobs in the building industry and help them provide facilities such as preschools, lunch clubs, exercise classes, libraries and activities to improve health and wellbeing.

Anne Fulcher, secretary at Aldham Village Hall, said: “Aldham has a well-used village hall. When dry rot was discovered in the roof timbers in 2007, a fundraising project was undertaken.

“Within seven years the village raised £42,000. Grants were sought, sufficient to rebuild the main hall at a cost of £160,000 plus VAT.

“VAT amounted to our total raised of £42,000 – we gave it all to the Government.

“To meet all the costs, we had to obtain a loan from the Rural Community Council of Essex.

“The hall is an essential part of the village, which has no shops, post office and a scant transport service to the nearest town six miles away.

“To maintain a rural community, it was important to rebuild a well-used facility.

“If the hall, originally built in 1926, had been left in it's precarious condition, it would have collapsed.

“To even pay ten per cent VAT on rebuilding costs would have been just within our capabilities, but to lose all of our funds to the Government wasabitter pill to swallow.”