2003 Pre-Budget Report Summary

Chancellor Gordon Brown presented his Pre-Budget Report on Wednesday 10 December. The traditional day for Budget statements has changed from Tuesday to Wednesday and, for various reasons, the timing of both the autumn statement and the main spring Budget has slipped. This is the latest an autumn statement has yet been delivered. Despite this, the speech whilst short in length and short on festive cheer covered many measures and proposals. In particular income tax allowances and national insurance rates and limits for 2004/05 were confirmed. We are pleased to report that the personal allowance has not been frozen for the second year in a row and that rates of Class 1 and 4 national insurance contributions have been held at their 2003/04 levels. A whole host of other areas warranted mention in the speech including the taxation of pensions, improvements to the Venture Capital Trust and Enterprise Investment Schemes, Research and Development tax relief, environmental measures and the normal raft of anti-avoidance measures many of them involving trusts.

The key points are included in this summary.