On Tuesday 29 November 2011, George Osborne, Chancellor of the Exchequer, delivered his autumn statement to the House of Commons against a background of global instability, a Euro area crisis, deep discontent amongst the public sector workers and a threat of a double dip recession.  With this in mind the theme of the statement was ‘building a stronger economy for the future’ with emphasis on enterprise, infrastructure, credit easing and fairness. 

We have put behind us the days of surprise Budgets concentrating now on pre-announced policy and consultation.  We did not expect significant tax announcements and did not get any.  What we did get was a series of measures aimed at stimulating growth, job creation and rebuilding our infrastructure whilst seeking to maintain a level of indebtedness which preserves Britain’s triple-A credit rating.

The tax announcements made yesterday were as follows:

The latest edition of our Focus Newsletter covering a range of taxation issues is now available.

The Agreement was signed on 6 October 2011, with the full text being released on the same day.

Most of its content is as we reported on 30 August 2011 following the initial official press releases and the detailed material issued by the Swiss Bankers’ Association.

Since October 2010, the UK and Swiss authorities have been negotiating on how the two countries can co-operate in tax matters.