Hike in income tax threshold aids low-paid March 21, 2012 NICK Clegg moved closer to securing a core Liberal Democrat aim on tax yesterday as George Osborne announced a shake-up of personal allowances that will affect up to 24m people. Osborne outlined plans to raise the threshold for paying income tax to £9,205, higher than a planned increase to £8,105, affecting those who earn less [...]
Lords demand facts on EU veto negotiations February 13, 2012 A PARLIAMENTARY committee has slammed the government’s inability to explain what “safeguards” it was demanding from European nations when Prime Minister David Cameron vetoed an EU treaty in December. The House of Lords EU Committee said that it has “repeatedly” asked ministers what exactly was at stake at the summit and has yet to get [...]
Osborne must explain his philosophy March 20, 2012 BUDGETS are not just about trying to outwit political opponents in a complex game of chess and propaganda, as some in Westminster believe. They are also about the vision that a chancellor and government wish to convey. In 1979, when Lord Howe slashed the top rate of tax from up to 98 per cent to [...]
Next calls for Sunday boost as sales jump March 22, 2012 NEXT CHIEF executive Lord Simon Wolfson said a permanent relaxation of Britain’s Sunday trading hours could add £40-£50m to the fashion retailer’s annual turnover. In Wednesday’s Budget chancellor George Osborne said he will introduce legislation lifting the six-hour limit on opening hours for larger stores over eight weekends from 22 July covering the Olympics. Wolfson [...]
Budget fuels crisis on the high street March 22, 2012 SOME of the UK’s most senior retailers yesterday slammed the chancellor’s supposedly pro-business Budget, saying his failure to address a planned hike in business rates will deal a blow to Britain’s ailing high streets. George Osborne has said he will cut corporation tax faster than planned to 24 per cent this year. But retailers were left [...]
Real tax reform is an impossibility until we shrink the size of the state April 4, 2012 EVERY year about this time, as the daffodils start blooming there is a call from some think tank, academic or economist for major tax reform. This year, it was Andrew Sentance, writing in The Forum. There are two responses that a politician can make to this. The wise but cautious one pays lip service to [...]
Protests over downgrade of Fred Goodwin February 1, 2012 SENIOR politicians and City heavyweights including Alistair Darling and Terry Smith yesterday led the backlash against the decision to strip of Fred Goodwin of his knighthood. Darling, the former Labour chancellor, said it was “tawdry” for the government to target Goodwin, and asked: “If it’s right to annul his knighthood what about the honours of [...]
CLASH OF THE PARTIES (SECOND PART) FOR RUDD March 1, 2012 Roland Rudd is not one for being fazed by party clashes. The formidable spin-meister’s splendid fiftieth birthday party last summer in his country-house near Glastonbury famously clashed with chancellor George Osborne’s fortieth birthday celebrations. One suspects some guests had a difficult choice to make but that didn’t stop around 500 of London’s business community, including [...]
CLASH OF THE PARTIES (SECOND PART) FOR RUDD March 1, 2012 Roland Rudd is not one for being fazed by party clashes. The formidable spin-meister’s splendid fiftieth birthday party last summer in his country-house near Glastonbury famously clashed with chancellor George Osborne’s fortieth birthday celebrations. One suspects some guests had a difficult choice to make but that didn’t stop around 500 of London’s business community, including [...]
We need an open contest to decide who will run the Bank April 12, 2012 THERE is no doubt that George Osborne’s most important decision over the next few months will be who he appoints as the next governor of the Bank of England. That job, which becomes vacant next year, is by a huge distance the most powerful unelected position in the UK; its formal powers now span monetary [...]