UK Budget 2014 - A budget for makers, doers and savers

The UK Chancellor of the Exchequer on 20 March 2014 handed down his 2014 Budget. He described it as a Budget for "makers, doers and savers". Certainly, there were measures to please individual savers and pensioners, but some of the announcements introduce at the conceptual and practical level additional complexity into the UK tax system, and it may take businesses time to adjust. Many of the measures had previously been announced in Autumn Statement 2013 and will be enacted in Finance Bill 2014, but there were additionally a number of new developments which could affect overseas investors.

Some of the key measures announced which could affect overseas investors include:

• The Annual Tax on Enveloped Dwellings (ATED) came into effect on 1 April 2013 and is a tax payable by companies (amongst others) which own high value residential property.
• Currently the ATED charge only applies to residential properties with a value over £2 million. Two new bands for the ATED will be introduced. Residential properties worth over £1 million and up to £2 million will be brought into the charge with effect from 1 April 2015.
• Mirroring the change to the ATED threshold the Government will also extend the 15% SDLT rate applied to enveloped residential properties to properties purchased for over £500,000 with effect from 20 March 2014.

Isaac Zailer and Casey O'Hara discuss these and the other more commercially important measures in detail in a briefing which can be found here.

Links to the HM Treasury Budget website and the HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) Budget website can be found here.

If you wish to discuss, please contact Gareth Thomas or Richard Norridge of our Private Wealth and Trusts team.