Tax is too complicated… say the legislators A parliamentary committee has been examining efforts to simplify tax, but progress is still a long way off. Among other things, last year’s ill-fated ‘mini-Budget’ was notable for the swiftness with which Jeremy Hunt...
Chartwell Wealth Management
Tax Insights
The Autumn Statement give and take
The Chancellor’s national insurance contribution (NICs) ‘giveaway’ is no match for his income tax ‘takeaway’. The central surprise in Jeremy Hunt’s second Autumn Statement was a major reduction in NICs. • For employees From 6 January 2024, the main class 1...
The child benefit tax rule changes
One of the few surprises in the Spring Budget was the change affecting how child benefit is taxed for higher earners. The high income child benefit charge (HICBC or ‘hicbic’) was introduced in January 2013 to reduce child benefit payments for higher earners. It was...
The march of the higher rate taxpayer
New calculations issued alongside the Spring Budget show just how higher rate taxpaying status is becoming ever more common. The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) received plenty of attention leading up to the Budget. It was widely portrayed in the media as the...
Spring Budget: a pre-election balancing act
What was almost certainly the last Budget before the election was a serving of the widely expected, sprinkled with a handful of small surprises. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt, delivered the Spring Budget 2024 on 6 March. As anticipated, it was a typical...
New tax year planning – start early
This new tax year starting on 6 April brings a range of changes that could affect your financial planning. The start of the new tax year will see many allowances and tax bands frozen once again. In reality these freezes are tax increases as the government has...
Demographics shift to minority married
New data on marriage and civil partnerships shows a significant threshold has been crossed. ‘Population estimates by marital status and living arrangements, England and Wales: 2022’, sounds like a rather esoteric piece of academic output from the Office for National...
HMRC, eBay and second-hand news
The media storm surrounding HMRC taxing eBay and other online sellers from the start of 2024 was, in fact, itself counterfeit goods. A crop of stories across social and traditional media swirled across the start of the new year about HMRC cracking down on ‘side...
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