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Finance (No. 2) Bill

No doubt the Paymaster General can respond for herself, but I fear the Government did not think through their proposals or did not understand their consequences. Most people in Britain are hopelessly underinsured. Those who insure are far less likely to fall back on benefits and state support than those who do not. Slapping arbitrary punitive new taxes on those who seek to make provision for death or serious illness to the main breadwinner makes no sense. It penalises thrift and prudent behaviour, and we hope the Government will support our amendments. The last set of Opposition amendments would remove the threat that an increased tax bill could be added by schedule 20 to all the other unhappiness that occurs in divorce cases. I refer to Mr. Ian Buckley of Rathbone solicitors, who explains the problem as follows:"““The current trend of family breakdown and multiple marriages has resulted in the increased use of trusts. They provide a fair and workable solution in the division of assets in circumstances of both death and divorce. They are widely used in the divorce courts and the inflexible arrangements in the new rules outline will be a poor substitute.””" Following the raft of Government amendments moved in Committee, the Chartered Institute of Taxation states:"““Overall we give the changes one and a half cheers—there are still things to be done. We now need the Government to show they have listened to all of our arguments about the defects in these proposals, and to make similar changes””""where schedule 20 impacts on divorce." In this context, trusts are used to give the spouse with the main child care responsibilities the right to live in the family home until the children finish their education. At this point the home is sold and the proceeds divided between the former spouses. Such arrangements will be protected from the 20 per cent. entry charge of schedule 20 by section 10 of the Inheritance Tax Act 1984, but not from the 6 per cent. periodic charge. The Treasury seems to assume that everyone can have a clean-break settlement. If they are able to do so, most people will indeed prefer a clean-break settlement for various reasons, emotional as well as financial. However, not everyone can afford a clean-break settlement. Trusts are an invaluable aid in making the assets of one household stretch to cover two. The people who will be penalised in this context, as in all the other contexts where schedule 20 applies, are those who have sufficient assets for them to come within the inheritance tax net, but not enough for them to have sufficient capital to spare for outright transfers and a clean-break settlement—the sort of people of modest means who have been hit all too often by the Chancellor’s stealth taxes. Remember that we are referring to homes here, and in many cases, particularly in London and the south-east, the value of those homes will exceed the inheritance tax threshold.