Brits back tax incentive plan to stop wealthy investors fleeing UK
Two thirds of Britons support offering rich investors tax incentives to stop them leaving the UK, according to a new report, as the government has been urged to design a special scheme to boost UK growth.
In a new paper by Onward and the Adam Smith Institute, around 67 per cent of the British public would support carve-outs to keep wealthy individuals in the UK.
Top wonks at the free market think tanks have designed a plan to offer 15-year tax exemptions to investors in UK growth sectors including life sciences and creative industries, winning the support of more than half of voters (53 per cent) in a poll conducted by JL Partners.
Policies wrapped under a scheme its authors have called the ‘Prosperity Package’ include making wealthy investors take up private healthcare, schooling and insurance on a mandatory basis and provide £300,000 in annual contributions to the state.
These high-net-worth individuals would also be mandated to make a minimum £3m in a high-growth sector outlined in the government’s recent industrial strategy.
But investors involved in the proposed scheme would see a 15-year exemption from foreign income, capital gains and global inheritance tax, allowing them to enjoy similar benefits as former non doms did before tax exemptions were ended by Jeremy Hunt and Rachel Reeves in successive governments.
Labour voters back tax plan for wealthy investors
Polling suggested that 53 per cent of voters backed the plan while just 15 per cent opposed it.
Researchers also revealed that nearly three quarters of Brits would accept more immigration if they paid more into the system.
In more surprising data, pollsters said 69 per cent of Labour voters would back a form of tax incentive to keep wealthy individuals in the UK.
Shadow business secretary Andrew Griffith said the new polling showed the Labour government was out of touch with voters.
“The British public can see what Labour ministers can’t: that there is nothing good about wealth creators fleeing the country leaving the rest of us to pay higher taxes or have worse public services,” he said.
“The government needs to reverse this disastrous policy faster than a seal in a shark tank.”
The think tanks suggested that the package would add more than £30bn to the UK economy by the tenth year of the package and provide the government with an extra £13bn in tax revenue over the same time period if it was taken up by 1000 individuals.
Onward director Simon Clarke, who was formerly Treasury secretary under Boris Johnson, said it was “crazy” for the government to drive wealthy people out of the country following the end of the non-dom regime.
“Our paper proposes a fair deal for all parties – and the public supports it. At a time of global tax competition and low growth, Britain cannot afford to get this wrong.”
Maxwell Marlow of the Adam Smith Institute said: “If the wealthy contribute significantly and don’t draw on the state, most voters are open to their investment.”