The Budget 2015 – 12:30

Cosimo · 18 Mar 2015 at 06:43

It’s that time of year again but this time the last one before the general election. The chancellor says that it will be budget for recovery with no giveaways but with the election looming we shall wait and see.

Coverage:

Online: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/business-31874987

TV: A BBC Two special from 11:30 to 15:30 GMT. Rolling coverage on the BBC News Channel

Radio: A Radio 4 special from 12:15 to 14:00 GMT. 5 Live special from 11:55 to 16:00 GMT

What to expect:

Raising the personal allowance from £10,600 to £11,000

Duty cut on beer and cider

£1m inheritance tax break on properties passed to children

Increase in NI threshold to help lower paid workers

The scrapping of the annual tax return and introduction of 55 million individual online tax accounts

New loans for students targeted at those from poorer backgrounds

Further crackdown on tax evasion

Green light for HS3

Tax cut for North Sea oil and gas industry

Reform of business taxes

A little something for everyone...

[TW]Fox · 18 Mar 2015 at 06:56

Surprised you missed the big one, abolition of tax on savings interest. RSS feed on the blink?

Tefal · 18 Mar 2015 at 06:59

[TW]Fox;27788137 said:
Surprised you missed the big one, abolition of tax on savings interest. RSS feed on the blink?

whats this?

is this basicaly any savings account is going to become an isa?

Skidder · 18 Mar 2015 at 07:00

Is inheritance tax single property or can it be spread?

Freakbro · 18 Mar 2015 at 07:19

Tefal said:
whats this?

is this basicaly any savings account is going to become an isa?

~~It's only if combined with your non-savings income it doesn't go over the personal threshold~~

It's aimed at pensioners again (surprise surprise!) who generally rely on savings income more than younger people. ~~If your total income goes over the tax threshold then the savings interest is taxed at 20% as normal~~

Edit : Actually, that's how it used to work, now it seems he is abolishing tax on savings for all but 'the rich' - maybe only those in the 40 or 45% tax band only? So yea....by the sounds of it savings accounts will become 'pseudo-ISA's....seems to make ISA accounts redundant then for most people?

Again, will have to wait for the detail. I suppose this way it's easy enough to change back when interest rates rise, and then leave just the ISA's again.

Skidder said:
Is inheritance tax single property or can it be spread?

More than likely just for what is classed as the main home. But not sure the details are out yet.

platypus · 18 Mar 2015 at 07:43

Freakbro said:
Again, will have to wait for the detail. I suppose this way it's easy enough to change back when interest rates rise, and then leave just the ISA's again.

.

I did wonder if this was just a sort of gimmick to encourage people to save (which is no bad thing) whilst interest rates are so low.

Freakbro · 18 Mar 2015 at 07:46

platypus said:
I did wonder if this was just a sort of gimmick to encourage people to save (which is no bad thing) whilst interest rates are so low.

Hey, there's not going to be any gimmicks or giveaways remember!

I wonder what the cut in beer and cider duty is then....

Call me cynical but this is going to be one huge election bribe of a budget

delta0 · 18 Mar 2015 at 07:50

Abolition of tax on savings is a good one. Saves doing a tax return every year when you go over the 20% rate. Would save HMRC a lot of paperwork and time too.

platypus · 18 Mar 2015 at 07:58

Freakbro said:
Hey, there's not going to be any gimmicks or giveaways remember!

I do wonder how we can afford all these things given that they are routinely preaching about further cuts that have to be made.

I wonder what the cut in beer and cider duty is then....

Keep people drunk so they don't care about the cuts to public services :eek:

?

Metallifux · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:17

A penny off beer and cider is completely and utterly pointless, the only people who benefit from that are the breweries.

Amp34 · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:32

Skidder said:
Is inheritance tax single property or can it be spread?

Supposed to be the main home, worked by allowing an extra £125k per parent as tax free over the standard inheritance tax threshold. So the final tax free amount will be about a million if there are two parents.

DXP55 · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:35

[TW]Fox;27788137 said:
Surprised you missed the big one, abolition of tax on savings interest. RSS feed on the blink?

If this is true then they are only doing it because there is no interest on savings at moment (nothing worth talking about) so they won't lose squat all.

Now if it was still 6% like 2008 then I would be jumping for joy but I never ever hold my breath on budget day

Dave

estebanrey · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:39

Amp34 said:
Supposed to be the main home, worked by allowing an extra £125k per parent as tax free over the standard inheritance tax threshold. So the final tax free amount will be about a million if there are two parents.

How does that work given 99% of the time it will only be one parent. It's unlikely both parents will die at the same time and presumably when the first one goes full ownership passes to the surviving parent no?

Genuine question and realise I'm probably being thick!

alx · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:40

Hoping for a significant revision of the North Sea tax regime, but not holding my breath.

Freakbro · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:46

estebanrey said:
How does that work given 99% of the time it will only be one parent. It's unlikely both parents will die at the same time and presumably when the first one goes full ownership passes to the surviving parent no?

Genuine question and really I'm probably being thick!

Yes, when the first parent dies, if the estate just goes to the surviving spouse, then so does their Inheretance Tax Allowance, so the surviving parent has double the allowance to use when they die.

John40 · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:52

Might as well not bother actually delivering it as everybody knows what's in it already as normal.

Raumarik · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:52

I really wish the Robert Peston would stop banging on about a £6 billion windfall, it's not it's just slightly less borrowing, we're still up to our necks in £1.4 trillion of debt.

I'd have more respect for the tory government if they came out and said "nope no bribes" to be honest, sadly no politician will ever do that.

Trifid · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:54

platypus said:
I do wonder how we can afford all these things given that they are routinely preaching about further cuts that have to be made.

I wondered how much it actually makes taxing the average savings account...

Freakbro · 18 Mar 2015 at 08:58

Trifid said:
I wondered how much it actually makes taxing the average savings account...

Look after the pennies and the billions look after themselves

It's all only a little here and a little there, but it adds up. Since we are still looking at an £80 Bn deficit with rumoured massive cuts incoming if the Tories get in again, why even bother with a couple of pence of beer and a little tax back from savings, I would rather pay these and have less swinging cuts from more essential services.

Mr Jack · 18 Mar 2015 at 09:12

I do wonder how George is going to manage to juggle a pre-election bribe and still managing to remain credible with his on-going line of "we must have all the austerity! Now!".

From the list, it looks like a pretty poor bunch of policies: tax cuts that primarily go to middle-to-higher earners; less tax for people who are already rich and receiving a chunky unearned income; less taxation on North Sea oil. None of that is good.

But, with budgets, the devil is frequently in the details so my guess is that we'll see a headline announcement that sounds good, followed by details coming out over the next few days that reveal it to be not quite what it seems.