Truncated Finance Bill is an affront to democracy

As part of the 'wash up' before Parliament finished its pre-election business, the 2010 Finance Bill has passed through in record time with very little debate. To facilitate this and to avoid extended arguments with opposition parties a number of contentious clauses were dropped.

If Labour are re-elected the dropped clauses will form part of a second Finance Bill that will also include those Budget announcements that were not in the first Finance Bill.

The key Budget proposals dropped from the 167 page Finance Bill published last week were:

• The increased duty on cider (clause 9)
• The abolition of the special rules related to Furnished Holiday Lettings (clause 65)
• The new landline duty on phone lines to pay for super-fast broadband (clause 23)
• The obligation to provide security for payment of PAYE (clause 58)

In another sad day for democracy other contentious issues have passed into law despite the absence of any material debate or discussion. I anticipated this scenario in my post last week: Finance Bill 2010 proves Parliament doesn't decide our tax laws. And some people wonder why I stopped giving tax advice!