Dear Mr Chancellor,

I appreciate it can’t have been an easy year for you, but it hasn’t been much fun for any of us. When you announce your Budget plans at the start of March, please don’t make it any more difficult than it has to be.
I’m sure that you will headline your announcements with further support for businesses in the current pandemic and rightly so. I’m equally sure that you must be tempted to start making us all pay for that support through increased taxes. But please resist the temptation to do too much too soon.

Rumour has it that you are planning some changes to tax on people who sell their businesses. You restricted that year, much to the disappointment of many, and there is no need to make it worse this time around.

Most of us who end up selling our businesses do so as part of our retirement plans and have made contributions to your piggy bank over many years in the business taxes we have paid. Please don’t be tempted to do anything aggressive.

There are also suggestions that you are going to be rotten to those who save for later years via a pension scheme. We are already encouraged to take the pressure off your state pension commitments by saving for ourselves in later years. Please don’t make it unattractive by withdrawing tax relief on contributions.

You seem to think that small businesses run as limited companies are drawing an unfair tax advantage. Most of them do it because it affords them protection from personal liability, not because of the tax savings. You have upset this group by excluding them from your pandemic support packages. Please don’t hit them again with unnecessary tax increases.

You can put the price of beer and petrol up if you must, but just a word of warning – you’ve closed the pubs and told us to stay off the road!
Whatever you do, Mr Chancellor, all our businesses and the entrepreneurs behind them need support at this time, not more taxation.

Kind regards,

Roger