The U.K. government said it remains committed to “all planned reforms” as it extended several live tax policy consultations by three months to allow more time for interested parties facing COVID-19 disruption to respond.
HM Treasury and HM Revenue & Customs published a revised consultation tracker reflecting the extension of 10 consultations and calls for evidence. But the government “encourages early responses from stakeholders where possible” to support its continuing consideration of the issues, Treasury said in an April 28 release. Several new consultations announced in the March budget will go ahead.
“The government is very grateful to the stakeholders who have already responded to these documents. But it is also acutely aware that there may be others who want to contribute but cannot do so because of the current situation with COVID-19. This extension should help them to do so,” Financial Secretary to the Treasury Jesse Norman said.
Nine consultations that were set to close in May will now close in August. They include draft revisions to the HMRC Charter and a call for evidence on ways to raise standards in the tax advice market. Amyas Morse’s independent review of the loan charge asked the government to improve the market in tax advice and devise a new strategy to establish “a more effective system of oversight, which may include formal regulation, for tax advisers.”
The other live consultations extended to August concern asset-holding companies in “alternative fund structures”; the design of a proposed plastic packaging tax; requiring businesses to notify HMRC when they have adopted an uncertain tax treatment; preventing abuse of the research and development tax relief for small and medium-size enterprises; tackling abuse of the construction industry scheme; tax effects of the expected withdrawal of LIBOR; and the application of the hybrid and other mismatches legislation. A call for evidence on the vehicle excise duty, scheduled to close in June, was extended to September.
Norman outlined in a ministerial statement the government’s intentions regarding several tax policy documents announced in the budget. The planned publication of consultations, calls for evidence, and response documents will go ahead over the spring and summer regarding a review of business rates; the design of a carbon emissions tax; a National Insurance holiday for employers of veterans; the insurance premium tax; the aggregates levy; HMRC’s civil information powers; a stamp duty land tax surcharge; electronic sales suppression; and how VAT works in the public sector.
The publication of documents related to tax conditionality, simplification of the VAT partial exemption and capital goods schemes, whether qualifying R&D tax credit costs should include investments in data and cloud computing, and stronger penalties for tobacco tax evasion will be delayed until the autumn, Norman said. The government will provide more detail later regarding the publication of documents on aviation tax reform, disguised remuneration schemes, the U.K. funds regime, an economic crime levy, the small brewers’ relief, and the social investment tax relief.
A Department for International Trade consultation on the creation of up to 10 free ports in locations across the U.K., scheduled to close on April 20, was extended earlier this month to July 13.
The announcement follows the second reading of the finance bill on April 27. Mel Stride, a Conservative MP and chair of the House of Commons Treasury Committee, urged the government to go ahead with the proposed digital services tax, which occupies more than 40 pages of the bill. Norman told MPs that the government will propose an amendment to the bill to provide for a new start date of April 2021 for reforms to the IR35 regime that were set to take effect for private sector engagements this month, until they were postponed in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The bill will be considered by a public bill committee on dates to be announced, but the committee must complete its deliberations and report back to MPs by June 25 in accordance with an agreed-on program motion.
The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales has asked the government to withdraw and consult on changes to inheritance tax rules on excluded property and the tax liabilities of company directors, it said in an April 27 briefing note.