Beginning of the end

Lord Carter has said that he will 'look again' at the change to the tax return deadlines. Speaking at an ICAEW conference on efiling today, he said:

'Clearly in the area of accelerated self-assessment filing there has been some controversy. People have made the case to me informally that this should be looked at again. Given what people have said, if a case can be made for reconsidering that, I will look at it again, and I look forward to seeing that evidence.'

It's not over yet, but the first aim of the campaign has now been achieved - it has been accepted that the issue of the filing date was not the subject of sufficient consultation during the review and that it needs to be properly considered. With all the evidence that has been amassed since, surely the deadline will be kept at 31 January for online filing.

Whilst all of you who were supporting the campaign will no doubt be very pleased, Lord Carter couldn't resist a little dig. He said that when his review had been published he had received letters saying 'thank you for giving me my Christmas back.' Presumably they were not representative of the profession as a whole, he said today. Presumably not...