July Budget 2015: Small business group wants tax reform
British small businesses are calling on chancellor George Osborne to reform and simplify the tax system in next week’s emergency budget.
The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) has asked the government to “widen the scope of reform to radically simplify the tax system and improve incentives to encourage investment”.
The small business group praised the seed enterprise investment scheme – a government programme providing tax relief to individual investors who buy into small, early-stage companies – and entrepeneurial relief – a tax break for business owners – for “having a positive effect in stimulating growth”.
But the FSB put pressure on the chancellor to ensure that the Treasury’s review of the business rates system “delivers a new, fully reformed system that is flexible, fair, transparent and efficiently adminstered”.
The small business group also asked the chancellor for a “gear shift in ambition and delivery of infrastructure”, saying the government needed to make a “clear decision” on airport capacity while upgrading rail networks.