In the news: May 2024

‘People often don’t know that they need to plan ahead for that tax bill. You really need to take stock if you receive one of those calculations.’

LITRG technical officer Kelly Sizer on BBC Radio 4’s Money Box, discussing how frozen thresholds have led to more people being taxed on their pensions, 2 March

‘It’s a really interesting Budget this year because we’re in that context of it being an election year. There’s pressure growing from MPs to cut taxes but, at the same time, [the Chancellor] has not got as much wiggle room as he’d like to do that.’

ATT technical officer Emma Rawson on BBC Radio Essex ahead of the Budget, 4 March

‘Cutting National Insurance rather than income tax means the Chancellor can say that his decisions on personal taxes benefit taxpayers across the UK. Had he chosen to cut income tax in England, this would have resulted in further divergence with Scotland.’

Sean Cockburn, chair of CIOT’s Scottish technical committee, in the Herald on tax cuts in the Budget, 6 March

‘The Chartered Institute for Taxation has said it is concerned the summer trial could have led to a drop in the number of people filing on time. Gary Ashford, of the CIOT, said the decision to make the summer closure permanent was “misguided”. Victoria Todd, of the Low Incomes Tax Reform Group, said: “HMRC’s online services, including guidance and the automated digital assistant, are not yet at the standard required to support a forced channel shift to digital.”’

The Daily Telegraph was one of many media outlets to carry CIOT reaction to the news of HMRC’s helpline closures on 20 March, also including The Times, Financial Times (which also quoted ATT), Guardian, Daily Mail and BBC Radio 2 and 4. A Press Association story quoting CIOT was syndicated across more than 200 regional and local media websites.

‘HMRC has reversed a decision to close its self-assessment telephone helpline for half of the year. Gary Ashford, from the CIOT , said that while many people wanted to use HMRC’s online services, the system was not yet functioning well enough.’

BBC News Online were among more than 40 media outlets to quote CIOT on the following day’s reversal of the announcement, 21 March