Partner Article

Mills & Reeve on the Autumn Statement

Deborah Clark, head of Private Tax and Trust in Mills & Reeve’s Manchester office, shares her thoughts on the Statement.

Frankly, today’s Autumn Statement was rather unexciting. There are two camps of thinking, do we as a country live within our means or do we spend our way out of it. Either way, bold action is required to repair our economy and fast. We wanted big gestures from today’s announcement to both address the deficit and support business, yet Mr Osborne simply tinkered around the edges ultimately producing a mixed bag.

Perhaps we were being optimistic or perhaps the Chancellor’s big changes are still to come but, if so, is he leaving things too late? We need the Treasury to come up with an innovative solution to kick start business and benefit the wider economy before our ‘decade of debt’ leaves us with a half century in arrears.

However, one positive step made today is that towards addressing the sharp practices used to avoid tax, seemingly aiming for the low hanging fruit of what is owed rather than searching for new revenues. This is perhaps bouyed by the media’s role in highlighting recent cases of multinational companies and celebrities which has hit a moral chord across the country – why can a multimillion pound business avoid paying its fair share of tax so easily while family owned businesses are unable to compete and the average citizen is being asked to contribute more and more? Its time the tax system was fair for all and I for one am glad this is being addressed.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Mills & Reeve, Manchester .