Harbinger of stability?

Let’s stand back and think about what the chancellor’s announcements say about the government’s overall approach to tax policy. He did not really give us an over-arching narrative and to an extent it has been necessary to read between the lines but having had a few days to go through all of the material and think about its significance I can see some key themes.

What rather than how

The first I might crudely describe as ‘what you get rather than how you get it’. In several areas the same point emerged: the tax outcome for a particular level of income should not depend on the form in which it is delivered. We see this most obviously in the proposals for restriction of salary sacrifice arrangements but there are others.

The government is going to look at the basis on which benefits in kinds are valued...