UK Alcohol Tax Escalator Scrapped and Scotch Duty Frozen

[bifter]

The UK Government's alcohol tax escalator will be scrapped while duty on Scotch whisky will be frozen, under the Chancellor's 2014 Budget.

An automatic tax escalator for alcohol, which saw duty on wine and spirits increase 2% above the rate of inflation since its introduction in 2008, will not be implemented again next financial year.

Announcing his 2014 Budget to Parliament today, Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne said that taxation on spirits, wine and cider will instead rise in line with inflation.

Beer was removed from the automatic alcohol duty escalator in last year's Statement, prompting spirits, wine and cider industry members to call for the same exemption.

Osborne said that the Government's recently announced ban on sales of below cost alcohol in supermarkets, was a "more targeted approach than the escalator"?.

Meanwhile, the Chancellor also announced that duty on Scotch whisky would be frozen.

The Scotch Whisky Association (SWA), Wine and Spirits Trade Association (WSTA) and the Taxpayers' Alliance launched the Call Time on Duty campaign, urging the Chancellor to end the automatic alcohol tax escalator and freeze duty.

Research commissioned by campaigners claims that this measure would boost public finances by £230 million and would create 6,000 new jobs.

A tweet from the SWA said that the "industry welcomes scrapping of alcohol duty escalator and duty freeze for Scotch Whisky. Good for consumers and businesses"?.

http://www.thespiritsbusiness.com/2014/03/uk-alcohol-tax-escalator-scrapped-and-scotch-duty-frozen/
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"Whisky is liquid sunshine."
[George Bernard Shaw]

[bifter]

A result!

While it is heartening to see this, it would have been good to see a rollback of some of the obvious damage that has been done to the domestic market - after all beer has had a penny of duty knocked off in successive years now. It's like not strangling someone any tighter when they're already losing consciousness.

Hopefully the freeze will be maintained for a few years and the pressure will ease a bit. Though does this mean that yet another category of duty has been created specifically for Scotch? Rather than tinkering around the edges a full harmonisation of duty across all categories is what's required. And as for the punitive HSBD, don't get me started
_________________
"Whisky is liquid sunshine."
[George Bernard Shaw]

[Brummie]

Good news and i think very much expected, a rollback would have been good but was never going to happen.

[Crane]

Yes good news but it is a pity it won't be rolled back. Wasn't the escalator tax due to end next year anyway, just a token gesture trying to buy votes with elections on the horizon and the escalator has already done the damage to the price of whisky and he will continue collecting this tax which he accelerated its increase over the past few years.