UK Law Society Warns Over 'Rushed' Finance Bill

by Robin Pilgrim, LawAndTax-News.com, London

16 May 2003

The UK's Law Society this week claimed that Finance Bill 2003 is too 'rushed' and complex, and urged the government to delay implementation of a key measure.

'The problem of the lack of clarity in the Finance Bill is compounded by the extemely limited time for its consideration, both by professionals and Parliament. The allocated seven days of Standing Committee scrutiny is woefully inadequate,' Law Society chief executive, Janet Paraskeva explained, continuing:

'Instead of allowing sufficient time for scrutiny of this Bill, the Government is choosing to rely on a wide power in the Bill to introduce secondary legislation to amend sections of it at a later date. This adds a further layer of uncertainty.'

'We would therefore urge the Government to defer implementation of the stamp duty land tax until 2004 to allow sufficient scrutiny to ensure it is workable.'

The Law Society chief also observed that newly introduced, and thus under-scrutinised sections of the Finance Bill completely rewrite rules which have been under development for the last 15 years.

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