You, like a majority of both taxpayers and accountants, may have been sweating and cursing over a keyboard last week to submit a last-minute tax return. Many by the end of that accursed process will have been shouting ‘bring back paper!’, a vain and pointless hope, I’m afraid. The ‘tax gap’ is the difference between the amount that HMRC thinks it should be getting and what’s’s actually paid. They reckon that if everyone paid what they should, another £40bn would go into the coffers, enough to build two new runways at Heathrow or to run the NHS for at least a couple of months. So would further digitising close the gap? I’d say, probs not. Those who don’t realise they should be paying are the least likely to do anything digital, to take advice or have anything to do with HMRC. Others, in a pub near you if you still have one, will duck and dive until the proverbial cows come home to avoid anything tax-related. And the rest have very clever lawyers and accountants. Financial advisers don’t get involved in that sort of thing, of course.
“Reeves backs down on plans to cut ISA limit”
So it looks as though Cash ISAs are safe for the moment (FTM – is that a thing?) Rachel has apparently ‘bowed to pressure’ from the banks and building societies and decided not to reduce the allowance to £4,000 for cash and to keep the £20,000 parity with Stocks and Shares ISAs. Bowed also to common sense, I’d say.
