The Enterprise Investment Scheme offers generous income tax and capital gains tax reliefs to investors in certain companies. These reliefs are available to “qualifying individuals” who subscribe for “eligible shares” in “qualifying companies” undertaking “a qualifying business activity”. Simple, isn’t it? The purpose behind the scheme is to encourage investment in start up companies and [...]
Yesterday, the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) published a revised version of the UK Corporate Governance Code (formerly the Combined Code). This new edition of “the Code” takes effect for financial years beginning on or after the 29th June 2010. The Code applies to all companies with a Premium Listing on the London Stock Exchange including [...]
The Institute of Directors has today called on George Osborne to consider and adopt seven “keys to success” which they say will need to be delivered by the Chancellor in the forthcoming emergency Budget. By adopting the 7 keys to success the IoD say that the Chancellor would help accelerate economic recovery. However failure to [...]
Now that George Osborne has finally made it to 11 Downing Street and is planning his “Emergency Budget”, I hope he look seriously at reducing the headline rate of Corporation Tax in order to attract international businesses to the UK as well as stemming the flow of UK companies moving their tax residence elsewhere. The [...]
The new Conservative/Lib Dem coalition government has just published the text of the Coalition Agreement made between the parties. Should you wish you may view this via the link below. The agreement states that it is the intention of the new government to increase the rate of Capital Gains Tax (“CGT”) for “non business assets”. [...]
Before the recent election all the three main parties were saying that they “had no plans to increase or extend VAT”. In fact the Labour Party actually ruled it out, but then they knew full well that the chance of them being in power, even with Lib Dem support, was fairly negligible. So it proved. [...]
I was talking to an Independent Financial Advisor a couple of days ago and in conversation asked him how he was getting on winding up the estate of a mutual client who died about 18 months ago. “Fine”, he said, “but it looks like we have paid too much Inheritance Tax on the house” – [...]
Just over a year ago I wrote about the visit to the Isle of Man undertaken by Vince Cable, then Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor who today was appointed Secretary of State for Business and Banking in the new Conservative – Liberal cabinet. Despite having been a stern critic of the island, calling it a tax [...]
The long-awaited Bribery Act 2010 was today (8th April) given Royal Assent and so has passed into law. The purpose of the new act is to reform the existing criminal law (which dates back over 100 years) and to provide a new, modern and comprehensive scheme of bribery offences that will enable courts and prosecutors [...]
As everyone must now know, Gordon Brown has finally set the date for the General Election for 6th May 2010. After recent months of a “phony war” the electorate finally has its chance to vote on the record of the Labour government in general and of Gordon Brown in particular. But not everyone realises that [...]
We now have official confirmation of what we have all known for months, if not years, the UK General Election will be held on Thursday 6th May. Since he bottled out of an early election following his unopposed “coronation” as Labour leader and thus also Prime Minister, it was clear that Gordon Brown was going [...]
History was made on this day when the London Stock Exchange (LSE) finally, after 200 years, allowed women to enter its premises as employees. One of the ten women in this first intake commented that the Exchange was the “last bastion of misogyny” and that business at the Exchange seemed to be carried out “at [...]
The recent worldwide financial crisis has clearly indicated that there is an urgent need to improve the effectiveness of company boards. This can only be achieved when all board members, together with shareholders, employees and other stakeholders, truly understand their roles and responsibilities. For over 10 years the Institute of Directors (IoD) have been offering [...]
One thing that can be clearly seen amid all the arguments over the status of Lord Ashcroft is that neither the press nor the politicians really understand the difference between someone being resident in the UK or being domiciled in the UK. It is rather painful to listen to the claim and counterclaim of so [...]
This is the shocking verdict which the authors of a new report, published by the Institute of Economic Affairs, have come to following an in depth study into tax related compliance and administration costs which fall on UK businesses. The report also reveals that the average Finance Act in the 2000s has been three times [...]
To try and deal with some of the economic problems encountered last year when Ireland’s “Celtic Tiger” economy collapsed in chaos, the Irish Government introduced a tax holiday for companies which commenced trading during 2009 under which, subject to certain conditions, they would pay no tax for a three year period. As things have not [...]
Cybercrime is endemic and whilst most people now know not to respond to emails asking for personal information or passwords few are aware of the dangers of “keyloggers”. What is a keylogger? A keylogger is a small piece of software which captures all of the keystrokes you make on your keyboard. Originally these programs were designed [...]
A new website has just gone online which will be of great help to anyone starting up a new business. One of the most common complaints on a whole load of business forums is that of someone who has an established business and finds that someone else has set up another business with the same [...]
Benjamin Franklin said, “In this life nothing is certain but death and taxes”. When anyone who is resident or domiciled in the UK dies those they leave behind will find that HMRC will want a slice of the dead person’s estate – their money, house, possession etc. This tax used to be called Death Duties [...]
There has long been a common misconception that the payment of fees to non-executive directors can be made without having to account for tax and National Insurance (NI) by way of the PAYE system. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Directors, non-executive or otherwise, are considered to be “officeholders” by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) [...]
