93: More winds of change – an update on the ongoing development of the regulatory framework and UK tax changes

For private client lawyers everywhere the increased strand of regulation which runs through their work for individuals, trusts and companies has been the most significant development in the last two decades. For UK private client lawyers tax legislative change has been the other great challenge in recent years.

In a piece titled ‘More winds of change’, originally published in the International Comparative Legal Guide to Private Client 2020 Helen Ratcliffe and Lara Mardell look at this challenging environment considering the developments on regulation, recent tax changes and some of the policy thinking which is emerging in relation to UK tax.

The chapter for this year’s publication builds on those written by the firm for this publication over the last two years (and links to those chapters are set out below) providing a useful timeline of recent developments.

Since publication of the chapter, the Conservative majority delivered by the 12 December 2019 General Election means that the more extreme proposals made in ‘Land for the Many’ (a report commissioned by the Labour Party) are unlikely to be developed further in the next five years of this Parliament. However UK property taxation would seem likely to continue in the political spotlight and some ideas from this report and the Office of Tax Simplification’s report on inheritance tax might form the basis for change in the years to come. We await Chancellor Sajid Javid’s first Budget, announced for 11 March 2020, with great interest.

Is privacy a chimera? (originally published in the International Comparative Legal Guide to Private Client 2019).

Keep calm and carry on: the increasing UK regulatory and tax Issues facing offshore trustees (originally published in the International Comparative Legal Guide to Private Client 2018).