Finance (No.3) Bill 2018
09 November 2018
The Finance (No.3) Bill 2018 was published on 7 November 2018, along with the necessary supporting documents.
It had its First Reading on Thursday 1 November (following the House's decisions on the Budget resolutions) and Second reading of the Bill is scheduled to take place in the House of Commons on Monday 12 November 2018.
There are 92 clauses in the Bill (a mere 315 pages long); key ones of interest include:
- Income tax charge for tax year 2019-20
- Main rates of income tax for tax year 2019-20
- Default and savings rates of income tax for tax year 2019-20
- Basic rate limit and personal allowance
- Starting rate limit for savings for tax year 2019-20
- Optional remuneration arrangements: arrangements for cars and vans
- Exemption for benefit in form of vehicle-battery charging at workplace
- Exemptions relating to emergency vehicles
- Exemption for expenses related to travel
- Beneficiaries of tax-exempt employer-provided pension benefits
- First-year allowance: expenditure on electric vehicle charge points
- Changes to periods for delivering returns and paying tax
- Resolution of double taxation disputes
- International tax enforcement: disclosable arrangements
Glyn Fullelove, Chair of the Chartered Institute of Taxation’s (CIOT) technical committee commented on the publication of the Finance Bill:
“In our view, there are too many measures in this Finance Bill which have not been through the government's tax consultation process.”
He said that the timetabling of the Bill adds to the ‘scrutiny deficit’ in that there have only been two working days between the Bill’s publication and its second reading debate on Monday 12 November and with the publication of a large amount of previously unseen legislation and the start of the committee stage, which is supposed to see detailed line by line scrutiny of the Bill, there is a real risk this Bill will not receive the scrutiny it should.
“The effects of inadequate scrutiny in the past are visible in the amount of ‘tinkering’ in the new bill. This is mostly desirable tweaks to ensure that previously introduced measures… operate as intended”, added Glyn Fullelove.
He concluded that the CIOT and its Low Incomes Tax Reform Group and the Association of Taxation Accountants will seek to provide briefing notes and other support to the MPs scrutinising the Bill as they always do, but with the number of new measures and the timeline involved, this will limit how thoroughly this can be done.
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CIPP comment The Policy team will also be working their way through the Bill and will publish items separately with the details we have gleaned. |