IR35: ‘Damaging’ tax changes set to hit self-employed workers July 11, 2019 Self-employed workers face paying controversial new taxes from next year as part of a measure that is set to rake in more than £3bn for the taxman. New ‘off-payroll’ rules to tax sole traders as employees if their working arrangement are deemed to be akin to regular staff will likely hit roughly 170,000 private sector [...]
British Airways owner IAG to cut more flights over winter September 10, 2020 British Airways owner IAG will cut more flights over the coming months than it had previously planned as the recovery in international air travel from the coronavirus pandemic stalls. In an operations update, IAG said that it would now fly at 40 per cent capacity through the autumn, down from past estimates of 54 per [...]
Why baijiu is set to take the UK spirits business by storm February 2, 2021 The famous Chinese poet Li Bai of the Tang Dynasty had some very precise ideas about drinking. He once wrote, “One’s drinking companions should be elegant, unrestrained, forthright, understanding, old friends or beautiful”. He further counselled that “The best places for drinking should be in front of flowers, in the bamboo forest, in a high [...]
Labour: Chancellor has ‘put off big decisions’ in summer statement July 8, 2020 Shadow chancellor Anneliese Dodds has accused Rishi Sunak of putting off many of the “big decisions” until the autumn. Responding to the Chancellor’s statement Dodds said” “Today should have been the day when our government chose to build a bridge on what has been done so far and what needs to be done… we should [...]
Rishi Sunak shoots down speculation he will raise capital gains tax July 15, 2020 Rishi Sunak has distanced himself from reports that he is looking at increasing capital gains tax to help pay for the government’s Covid-19 spending. The Treasury announced yesterday it was commissioning the Tax Simplification Office to conduct a study “asking for “evidence to seek views about capital gains tax”, prompting speculation from financial services firms [...]
‘Real possibility’ coronavirus patients infectious for more than 7 days July 30, 2020 There is a “real possibility” people may continue to be infectious with coronavirus for longer than seven days, the UK’s four chief medical officers have said. In a statement, the medical officers said patients with Covid-19 “have a low but real possibility of infectiousness between seven and nine days after illness onset.” The self-isolation period [...]
Ryanair sinks to £168m loss in coronavirus-hit quarter July 27, 2020 Ryanair reported a narrower than expected loss in its fiscal first quarter on Monday and said it was impossible to say whether it might turn an annual profit due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Irish airline posted an after-tax loss of €185m (£168.64m) for the three months to 30 June, its first-ever [...]
Boris Johnson targets Brexit trade talks with von der Leyen to agree summer deal June 2, 2020 Prime Minister Boris Johnson is planning to hold Brexit trade talks with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in June, it is reported, with hopes of securing a deal before autumn, it is reported. “We need a broad agreement in place by the summer,” an unnamed UK official was quoted as saying by the [...]
Now’s not the time to worry about £500bn of borrowing, says IFS July 9, 2020 The UK’s budget deficit could balloon to £350bn this year and £150bn the next, but tax rises or spending cuts to tackle the public debt should not be implemented “any time soon,” the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has said. However, IFS boss Paul Johnson warned that the chancellor was spending huge amounts and that [...]
New job retention bonus at heart of Rishi Sunak’s £30bn spending spree July 8, 2020 UK chancellor Rishi Sunak today put a new “job retention bonus” programme to encourage companies to bring back furloughed workers at the centre of a £30bn package aimed at kickstarting the economy. In his summer statement, Sunak said employers who take back furloughed workers until the end of January will receive a £1,000 payment for [...]