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Finance Bill

Changes announced this year, which will be legislated for next year, include a big simplification of the income tax system, with just two rates at 20p and 40p, and measures to take 200,000 children out of poverty and to take nearly 600,000 pensioners out of income tax altogether. The Bill also includes measures to safeguard revenues, dealing with schemes such as those that we debated today, which are unfair on the vast majority of taxpayers who pay their fair share. The Bill introduces reforms to determine penalties for errors. not only on the basis of the amount of tax understated, but by the type of behaviour that caused the understatement and the extent of taxpayer disclosure. The Bill includes measures to protect the environment. This has been a decade of unprecedented macroeconomic stability and uninterrupted growth, but the Stern report made it clear that such success will not be possible in the future unless we make reducing carbon emissions a priority.