Reporting Back: Finance Bill

Back in October last year the Government announced lots of positive measures in the Budget to support business, jobs creation and investment in our public services. I have previously blogged extensively about the policies announced which you can find out more detail about this on my website at the below web address.

http://www.chloesmith.org.uk/local/news/budget-2018

This week in Parliament the Finance Bill 2017-19 has come back to be completed in the House of Commons after its committee stage. The Finance Bill is the main legislative vessel through which measures announced in the Budget are enacted into UK law. You can keep up to date with the progress of the Finance Bill 2017-19 at the below web address.

https://services.parliament.uk/Bills/2017-19/financeno3.html

In this Finance Bill we can see that the Government is determined to support hardworking people and keep taxes low, allowing working families to keep more of what they earn. Measures in the Finance Bill 2017-19 will see the Government will meet its commitment to raise the Personal Allowance threshold to £12,500 from April 2019, one year earlier than planned.

The £650 increase to the Personal Allowance means that in 2019-20 a typical basic rate taxpayer will pay £130 less tax than in 2018-19 and £1,205 less tax than in 2010-11. Overall, 32 million individuals will see their tax bill reduced in 2019-20 compared to 2015-16. This is helping lots of people in Norwich North with the cost of living.

Further changes in the Finance Bill will see the abolition of stamp duty retrospectively for first-time buyers of all shared ownership properties up to £300,000, helping more people to get a foot on the housing ladder. I support this because I want more families in Norwich to be able to have a home of their own.

In addition to these changes, we will see a further fall in corporation tax, down to 17% in 2020 which will be a boost for business, continuing to deliver the lowest corporation tax in the G20. It is because of these kind of measures from a Conservative Government that we see Forbes again rank the UK the best country in the world in which to do business in 2018 - and why does that matter? Because it’s people’s jobs.

I will continue to support the Government in Parliament to deliver more good jobs and support business growth here in Norwich and I look forward to seeing these measures come into force as I know they will be of direct benefit to many of my constituents.