Readying ourselves for a fresh start

The summer months are finally upon us and we’ve enjoyed highlighting National Volunteers’ week through a range of social media activity. If you studied our 2021 annual reports, you will have seen that around 18,150 hours for CIOT and around 6,000 hours for ATT were volunteered to both charities for which we continue to be extremely grateful and fortunate. We also marked the start of PRIDE and hope that those of you who will be celebrating this month have a terrific time. It will be fabulous to see the various street parties, events and processions return in person again after a hiatus.

You may recall earlier this year we invited an external company to undertake a Diversity and Inclusion survey of students and members. Thank you to the 3,042 who participated and provided really helpful feedback and suggestions which will be considered by the Joint EDI Committee with a view to refreshing and refocusing our EDI activities. We will publish a summary of the findings in the next issue.

We were delighted to welcome the new Presidential team at the CIOT’s AGM on 31 May and soon for the ATT Leadership team at its forthcoming AGM on 14 July. Please do register to attend if you receive an email from Civica.

The CIOT was pleased to host its annual CTA Address on 7 June with Dame Margaret Hodge delivering the keynote address. Delivered in a hybrid format, Margaret was invited to present her views on what a responsible tax system looks like with panellist responses from John Whiting and Dan Neidle. You can access the recording and/or a blog of the debate on the CIOT website.

Making Tax Digital continues to be a key focus for our technical teams. We know that many members are concerned about the practicalities and timescale of MTD for ITSA, including how they can get themselves and their clients ready for 2024. 

The ATT and CIOT are engaging with HMRC to share members’ concerns and highlight key issues that need to be addressed. This includes attending two different standing HMRC groups – the MTD Advisory Forum and the MTD Digital Implementation Forum (which brings together professional bodies, HMRC and software developers). Special break out groups have also been formed to take a ‘deep dive’ approach to specific problem areas (including how to ‘teach’ MTD, the agent–client relationship, and property/landlords). ATT volunteers will also be taking part in a series of HMRC roundtable events focusing on the concerns of ‘high street agents’.

Outside of these main groups, we also have frequent ad hoc meetings and calls with HMRC. The technical teams are always interested in hearing from members about their experiences and concerns.  You can contact them by emailing atttechnical@att.org.uk or technical@ciot.org.uk. As we get more information from HMRC, we will continue to share this with members through our weekly newsletter and on our websites. We are also looking to host a joint ATT-CIOT MTD webinar in September – keep an eye out for more information in the coming months.

If you are finding opportunity for a summer break over the next couple of months, we hope you are able to make the most of that time with family, friends or to yourself. Whilst we wouldn’t advocate unhealthy eating, perhaps the summer holiday staples can be enjoyed absent of any new salt and sugar tax. We will certainly be enjoying an ice-cream, or two!