RARE ALERT: HM Treasury said to be weighing major changes to property tax; may even abolish stamp duty - part 3
I see my former employer, The Daily Telegraph, has picked up on a theme little old Betaville has been writing about for the last month or so. Today, the venerable newspaper splashed the main book on a campaigning piece - dubbed 'Stamp duty' - advocating major changes to the tax (for readers outside of the UK you have to pay stamp duty when you purchase a property). Here is a link to the The Daily Telegraph's splash story:
Now, readers of little old Betaville will be familiar with the RARE that has been wafting through the City of London over the last couple of months about Philip Hammond, Chancellor of the Exchequer, weighing major changes to stamp duty. There was even a suggestion in some quarters that he might abolish stamp duty altogether, which would be a very radical move. In case you missed it, here is a link to little old Betaville's piece from the middle of September:
However, the last time I checked in with my banker chums who have a line in to Mr Hammond the suggestion was from the man nicknamed "spreadsheet Phil" at the Tory party conference was that it's very unlikely he will get rid of Stamp duty. Tory bankers also said he seems unwilling to engineer much change to the regime brought about by his predecessor, George Osborne, a couple of years ago. Here is a link to little old Betaville's piece from earlier this month:
But who knows, perhaps The Daily Telegraph and its editorials will convince Mr Hammond to change his mind.....