IR35 – throw a six and start again

The chancellor’s recent mini-budget statement contained a string of surprise announcements which have been heavily commented on in the press over recent days. Possibly one of the biggest surprises for me was the proposed further revisions to the IR35 rules.

1. What was proposed by the chancellor?

The announcement was that the government proposes that the changes made to the IR35 rules in 2017 and 2021 are reversed in April 2023. This means that from April 2023 IR35 is operated how it was before the above changes had been introduced.

There have been some comments in the press and on social media suggesting that IR35 had been scrapped but that is not the case and all it means is that from April 2023 we need to operate under the pre-2017 rules. The guidance from the Treasury states that clarification on how the arrangements will work from April 2023 are...