Change at No10 Downing Street
A new period of this government begins for us all, again! We have a new Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak and a new cabinet facing the toughest economic conditions in decades. So what actions can we expect from the government in the next few weeks? Chancellor Jeremy Hunt will outline the UK’s tax and spending programme on…
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Creating Value Through Innovation
Innovation has generally been recognised as essential for value creation, both for individual companies and for the UK economy as a whole. The development of new ideas, processes and technologies and their flow across different sectors is a significant driver of economic growth and productivity. Recently, innovation has also been identified as crucial to the…
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A fiscal U-turn without precedent!
Over the last few days, we have seen a gradual dismantling of the mini-budget of Friday 23 September 2022, along with the economic policies that Prime Minister Liz Truss based her leadership campaign on. Designed to ensure the UK’s economic stability and provide confidence in the Government’s commitment to fiscal discipline, the emergency statement confirmed:…
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Making Tax Digital (MTD) for income tax
Self-employed businesses, partnerships and landlords with annual gross business or property income above £10,000 will need to follow the rules for MTD for Income Tax from their next accounting period starting on or after 6 April 2024. Making Tax Digital (MTD) is a government initiative to modernise HMRC’s tax system, with the aim of making…
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U-turn on the top rate of tax
Facing huge criticism and market turbulence following his announcement of a series of “growth” measures, Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng has backtracked on his decision to abolish the 45p rate of income tax paid by people earning more than £150,000 a year. The proposal to scrap the rate had been criticised as unfair at this time of…
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Abolishing IR35
The Chancellor has announced plans to abolish the IR35 off payroll working rules for the public and private sector from April 2023 The measure will cost up to £1.1bn a year from 2023-24 tax year, rising to £2.6bn by 2026-27. The off payroll working rules were introduced in 2017 for the public sector and 2020…
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Government Growth Plan
The package of measures to deliver a pro-growth, simplified tax system that supports business investment across the United Kingdom, and allows people to keep more of their own money. This comes a day after the government announced that the Health and Social Care Levy (HSCL) of 1.25% due to be introduced from April 2023 will not…
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Research & Development Tax Credit
HMRC have started writing letters to some companies that have been making claims for Research and Development (R&D) relief suggesting that they may be fraudulent. This is the result of the system being abused by some spurious claims, but the tone of the letter may alarm some recipients. The HMRC Fraud Investigations Services unit has…
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Making Tax Digital
Making Tax Digital for VAT – New penalties for non-compliance HMRC have issued guidance for VAT-registered business and their agents on how to avoid penalties for non-compliance with the Making Tax Digital for VAT (MTD) rules. In particular, there is a new £400 per return penalty if you file a return but do not use…
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High Income Benefit Charge Catching You Out?
Mistakes made when claiming higher rate child benefit are most frequently the result of poor communication from HMRC and it is more difficult for those with complex, fluctuating earnings The high income child benefit charge (HICBC) raised £416m in 2019-20 but it is a hard tax charge to administer as many of the families affected…
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