As practitioners recover from the January tax filing season attention turns to what may be of interest to both clients and tax practitioners in the coming year.
April sees the start of a new tax year and significant tax rises particularly in national insurance where the increase will affect dividends as well as earnings. A number of companies will be looking at whether they can take effective measures to bring forward payments in order to mitigate the tax rise. End of year planning courses may be something to consider in early March.
For the past three years HMRC has been diverting resources to deal with Brexit (particularly at the ports) but also administering the support payments instituted as a result of Covid. With the return to more normal conditions, HMRC will be looking to ramp up its number of investigations. HMRC has also acquired new powers as well as sources of information. A tax investigation course which refreshes knowledge in these areas may be useful.
Tax authorities have been increasing the pressure on particularly larger companies to provide more information regarding their activities.
These include country by country reporting, new transfer pricing disclosures, disclosure of tax strategies and notification of uncertain tax treatments as well as revising their strategy on Senior Accounting Officers’ disclosures. Senior employees of large companies may be interested in how these measures will affect them.
IR35 continues to provide cases for the courts to decide. The recent trend has swung in HMRC’s favour. A seminar looking at the current state of play would be of interest to practitioners who deal with status claims.
Research & Development expenditure has been subject to a government review followed by significant changes to the way that the scheme will operate. A seminar looking at the new opportunities as well as the anti-avoidance legislation should refresh participants knowledge in this area. Finally creative reliefs have benefited from a temporary increase to the allowances. This has been accompanied by some anti avoidance legislation.
Finally, the G7 agreement in June 2021 is being expanded to encompass how the two principles will be implemented. This will have far reaching consequences for businesses that trade internationally. This will be combined with increases in Corporation Tax in 2023, which will make planning for companies more rewarding.
