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The lack of a thorough update from the Chancellor on capital gains tax reforms led to disappointment throughout the tax world today.
Despite being expected to reveal details of his plans for CGT, Alistair Darling merely announced that he was still considering consultations, and he had 'received a wide range of proposals'.
Final facts may now not be available until the New Year, he added.
Penny Bates of Menzies said the news was 'very disappointing' for tax advisers.
She added: 'As the wait goes on, it makes it more and more difficult to help clients make decisions.
'We [the tax profession] could have had the Christmas holiday to look at the new information. Now we'll probably get it in January, when we're at out busiest — and then we most likely won't have much more information until the Budget in March.'
Andrew Hubbard, Tenon's national tax technical director, remarked that the lack of details from the Chancellor would leave business people 'in limbo' over key decisions.
'Until we have firm proposals, we simply do not know what direction the Government will be going in,' he said. 'The whole exercise has been conducted the wrong way round. We should have had consultation first, with proposals to follow.
'Any changes will be seen as a climb down rather than a sensible measured response to proper consultation.'
Acting leader of the Liberal Democratic part, former economist Vince Cable, believed was blunt: 'It is entirely unacceptable that hundreds of thousands of businesses should be forced to live in this continued environment of uncertainty purely because the Government bungled its original proposals'.
Dr Cable went to on to say: 'By failing to properly consult business in the first instance over these reforms, the Chancellor showed total ineptitude. Alistair Darling's continued dithering is just making a bad situation worse'.
Fiona Downes of ifs ProShare, which seeks to promote the benefits of employee share ownership, was a little more optimistic.
She said: 'We hope that the delay announced today will only be a short one. While it's important that the Government fully considers all proposals, employee shareholders and employers need an end to this uncertainty as quickly as possible'.
