City AM has published a superb chart on whether or not you have to pay VAT on your lunch under the recent u-turn on the rules.
The City AM chart, by Lizzie Fournier, shows just how ridiculously complex the rules on VAT are. But while VAT rules are unfair and overly complicated, the Government’s so-called simplification did little more than shift the boundary of unfairness from one area to another. Instead of tinkering around with the rules on VAT that provide no real simplification benefits, the Government should take a look at the 2020 Tax Commission’s final report ‘The Single Income Tax’ and get to work on implementing its serious yet radical measures to truly simplify Britain’s absurdly complicated tax code.
