Draft Finance Bill 2012: Construction industry will be breathing sigh of relief
Christine Oates, tax partner at Ernst & Young comments on the Land Remediation Relief legislation, released in today’s draft Finance Bill: “One of the good news items in today’s draft Finance Bill was that the government has retained Land Remediation Relief, one of 43 reliefs identified for review by the Office for Tax Simplification and widely expected to be scrapped. The construction industry will be breathing a sigh of relief, particularly the smaller house builders which have been some of the biggest users of the scheme to date. This generous relief has helped developers with the cost of extracting materials such as asbestos, knot weed, or even oil spillages; 1300 companies made use of the relief last year alone, at a cost to the Treasury of £40million.
“At a time when the construction industry is struggling, today’s announcement will be a much needed boost. The consultation process has played a positive role in this with an acceptance from the Government that this relief does stimulate the desired activity and withdrawing it would add further hardship to an industry already under pressure.”
