So at last we have a date for this year's Budget - 24 March 2010. But will it be worth the wait? With Easter at the beginning of April, and a general election to follow shortly after, there is little prospect of any serious measures being enacted before a new government takes power. It seems likely therefore that the Finance Bill will contain only the basic measures required to keep the tax collection system in motion for 2010/11, and a few previously announced technical changes that need no more debate. The real, more 'interesting', budget will surely be the one in June or July this year.

We will be blogging on Tax Plus Blog and SME Plus Blog on Budget day. If you do not already subscribe to our blogs click here for Tax Plus Blog or here for SME Plus Blog to ensure you get our comment and analysis as and when it happens.

Rachel Haddow is a tax adviser and a manager at Mercer & Hole. The views given in this blog are personal to the author, if you would like to discuss the contents of this post with Rachel you can call her on 01727 869141.

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...but says it will now appeal to the House of Lords.

Essentially Vodafone is arguing that UK rules on the taxation of profits of foreign subsidiaries (Controlled Foreign Company rules) are incompatible with European Union law. However, the Court of Appeal ruled that CFC rules apply to companies operating outside the European Economic Area and also to EEA companies without genuine economic activities.

The UK tax legislation is designed to stop UK companies avoiding tax by diverting income to subsidiaries in low-tax countries.

Comment on this blog in the space provided below, or visit my profile for details of how to contact me. 

Cathy Corns is a Tax partner at Mercer & Hole.  
 
 

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According to new research by Creditsafe, a business information company, SMEs are spending an average of 15.7% of their total expenditure costs in fulfilling tax obligations.

Tax ranks third in the league table of total business expenditure for SMEs, with wages accounting for almost a third (29%) of total expenditure and investment in stock and materials running at 17.5%. Fuel costs now account for 10% of overall costs. This does seem to put the cost of fuel into perspective!

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The House of Lords issued their judgement in the case of Jones v Garnett (also known as the “Arctic Systems Ltd” case) on 25 July 2007. To much rejoicing the case was decided in favour of Mr and Mrs Jones. However, the Revenue is a bad loser.

On 26 July a written Ministerial statement was issued by the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury, announcing the intention to change the law.

Using the standard “the Government is committed to maintaining fairness in the tax system” statement the Government now believes it needs to do something to “ensure that there is greater clarity in the law regarding its position on the tax treatment of income splitting”. Actually, in my opinion, the law is now clear – it may not say what the Revenue wants it to, but that is unfortunate (for them) rather than unclear.

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The long awaited decision on Arctic Systems

This all seems to have been going on for so long you may need reminding of what all the fuss is about; so

- Mr and Mrs Jones ran a small IT company of which Mr Jones was the sole director. They each owned one share in the company took a small salary and extracted the majority of their required funds by way of dividend. These, of course, were paid in line with the shareholdings, on a 50:50 basis.

Nothing out of the ordinary there so what was the problem? It seems to be that Mr Jones paid tax at higher rates and Mrs Jones did not. HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) argued that the settlements legislation should apply to the dividends paid to Mrs Jones such that they should actually be taxed (at the higher rate) on Mr Jones.

The Special Commissioners and the High Court (April 2005) agreed with HMRC, however the Court of Appeal (December 2005) rejected HMRC’s argument.

The result of all this is that there has been significant doubt about the correct tax treatment and obligations to report income and dividends in such circumstances.

The House of Lords unanimously decided in favour of the taxpayer. The key issue appears to be that an ordinary share is not “wholly … a right to income” and therefore the dividends are not caught by the settlements legislation.

This represents a resounding success for taxpayers and gives them back the right properly to plan their affairs in companies and partnerships.

If you were waiting for this judgement to instigate any planning or indeed need help on amending returns for earlier years, please contact any member of our tax team

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