BIA submission to the HMT consultation on a single R&D tax relief scheme
The BIA has responded to HM Treasury’s consultation on a single R&D tax relief scheme. In our submission, we highlighted that:
- The UK has a truly world-leading life sciences industry that is growing in size and impact as a result of long-term support from successive governments, most crucially via the R&D tax relief scheme.
- We welcome the intention to create a new simplified regime to ensure taxpayers’ money is spent as effectively as possible to support innovation and improve international competitiveness while reducing fraud and misuse of public funds.
- This can be achieved if the following four requirements are met:
- Provide an additional rate of credit for R&D-intensive SMEs
- Exclude soft innovation
- Include sub-contract R&D as eligible expenditure
- Support specialist R&D service providers
We also set out our proposals for the structure of a merged scheme.
This submission follows on from the BIA’s previous submission to the Finance Bill Sub-Committee of the House of Lords, as part of its inquiry into the Draft Finance Bill 2022-2023, and complements the BIA’s submission to HM Treasury for the Spring Budget 2023.
