Inoff the Red

This is one of the key tests to determine whether someone is self employed or employed. It is a matter of time before the BBC gets caught by this because there is no way that they would allow a substitute to appear. With regards to the merits of the decision, I would be amazed if Pimlico Plumbers appealed the decision because the facts suggest that the worker was employed. I understand that he brought the case because his circumstances changed. It will be interesting to see how his colleagues react to this if they are now deemed to be employed. As self employed they wont worry too much about the Working Time Directive and probably work long hours to earn the six figure sums they have been doing. As employees they will find it difficult to put the hours in to maintain those earnings (and if P Plumbers allows/encourages them to work in excess of the WTD limits they are setting themselves for another appearance in front of a tribunal when another workers "circumstances change").

Following on from the various comments about TR, there has been an interesting case in the Peoples Republic of Nottingham where an Imam has just been sent down for 5 years for abusing a young boy (one of his congregation) in the mosque. The victim commented that they had been vilified by his local community for bringing the action against the imam. It has just been reported in the local news that some supporters of the imam have named and further vilified the victim on social media, a crime that carries a potential six month spell in chokey. It will be interesting to see if Plod and the judiciary are as diligent in dealing with this "contempt" as they were with TR.

The silence of virtue signalling social justice warriors is hardly surprising. If a white male makes a careless comment that can be construed as mysogenistic then the Feminazis are all over the media demanding the perpetrator is sacked from his job. But the same people are strangely silent over FGM, forced marriage, segregation in meetings on the basis of gender and , of course, the grooming of underage girls.

As you say, this has been written from a definite anti TR stance. Of course the perceived "threat" to a fair trial is all in the mind of the judge. If you have ever served on jury you will know that you are ordered not to do any research on the case and to avoid anything on the internet or social media that makes reference to the case so in reality the prospect of TRs broadcast being seen by jurors is remote. I would be interested to read thesecretbarrister's legal justification for the apparent two tier legal/policing system that has developed whereby TR can be assaulted by his opponents with impunity, where he is ejected from Speakers Corner because of the threat of public disorder while doing nothing about the people that were actually threatening to breach the peace. Stepping back from the detail of the TR case and looking at things generally, it is difficult to escape from the view that justice and power is abused by those that wield it. The "Establishment" has a clear bias that is used to promote their preferred agenda and protect the chosen few.

Pity the police didn't act so quickly in dealing with the various grooming gangs. There is an interesting piece on Youtube by Andrew Norfolk, the Times investigative journalist that spent years investigating the grooming gangs. He goes into detail about the wall of silence from social services and how, having exposed the crime in various cities, the police spent their time and effort trying to stop the story and locate anyone that may have been a whistle blower instead of going after the real criminals! You have to ask yourself why. Warning: Watching that clip from an established and well respected journalist will make your blood boil.

I agree that TR's actions may not have been the brightest, but he was set up by the establishment who then reacted in a disproportionate manner because TR is not one of the favoured few. It was ok for the BBC (in cahoots with Plod) to hire an helicopter to film the raid on Cliff Richard's house and spread that over the airways and justify it on public interest grounds but to highlight yet another grooming scandal which is arguably in the public interest triggers a different response? From the clips I have seen of the events leading to TR's arrest he was filming outside the court in the same way you see film crews outside most courts these days....and if it is such a heinous crime, why the D notice? Why not be open about his arrest and allow the reason for his imprisonment to be publicised? I dont think TR discriminates on the basis of race and I daresay if there was a Roman Catholic or Buddhist grooming gang that acted with impunity for years protected by political correctness he may have said something about that also. I disagree that freedom of speech is not an issue, it is. Look at the treatment of journalist Lauren Southern and others earlier this year. Look at the line of BBC questioning of JRM asking whether he was fit for high given his religious views. Can you imagine the BBC asking Sadiq Khan if his religion was inconsistent with being London Mayor given his religion's treatment of women, FGM etc etc? Can you imagine the outcry if they did? The Cathy Newman interview of Prof Jordan Peterson also demonstrated the agenda of the MSM. for those that have not seen it, it is worth looking up on Youtube. it was good to see someone with intellect deal with the rather pathetic attempts to paint Peterson as some far right loon and misrepresent what he actually said. The selective and inconsistent treatment of anyone opposing the Common Purpose New World Order views is now barely concealed.

I think the authorities have made a mistake with their treatment of TR and the banning order raises more questions about the motives of the police/judiciary. Regardless of what one may think of TR's views (and I don't think he is as extreme as he is painted in the media) he has been failed by the police who appear to shrug their shoulders and do nothing when he is threatened/assaulted but when he highlights yet another grooming trial he is carted away. I have recently finished a spell on jury service and there were dozens of cameras outside court, seems there is one rule for some and another rule for others. For those that think TR has got what he deserved, I reproduce below Niemoller's poem which seems just as apt today as it did when written. First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out— Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me. We live in dangerous times and I think there is a real chance of civil unrest because of the disconnect between politicians and the electorate. A cynic may suggest that this is the real reason why the EU wants its own army, not to protect against outside forces but to suppress dissent within.

Yes but if a dealer is selling a second hand piece of kit for £10k including vat, a private seller with the same piece of kit will still want close to £10k for the same item so you still end up paying broadly the same amount for the item.

Firstly, if you are not vat registered and pay £20,400 for a piece of kit (being £17,000 plus £3,400vat ), then if you are not vat registered you cannot offset the vat paid against vat payable on your sales. I understand what you mean about that vat "being money you will never see again" however, don't forget that for the purposes of claiming your annual investment allowance/capital allowances, the base cost of the machine is £20,400 not £17,000 so, for a 40% tax payer your tax liability will be lower. How much lower depends on whether you are paying tax at 20% or 40%. As for buying a second hand chipper from someone that is not vat registered, the reality is that the price of second hand equipment is determined by the market and not by someone's vat status.

That's a bit harsh Kev! HMRC have cottoned on to the fact that motor manufacturers are bringing out luxury versions of their double cab pick ups and exploiting soft tax rules and imho it is a matter of time before they change the rules. Having said that I don't understand what the accountant's concerns are. Chipperclown, I presume you are buying the vehicle in your own name as a sole trader and not through a limited company. In any dealings with HMRC, the strength of your arguments depends on the facts. If you can demonstrate use of this vehicle in your business (and it is not just a runaround for the missus to take the kids to school) then I can see no reason why the costs would not be an allowable deduction (and the vat reclaimed). I have to say though that I groan when I see some of the advertising blurb attached to some car adverts suggesting huge tax savings but normally (in micro dot writing) there will be a disclaimer advising any prospective purchaser to take advice before buying. I would suggest that any capital purchase should be justified on it's contribution to business efficiency and not because of some tax saving. I have seen huge amounts wasted over the years on stuff bought "to save tax" that was little more than money down the drain.

A subby is not an employee. If they were, they would not be sub contractors. In the event that a subby's status was challenged by HMRC, a document floating around that described them as an employee could lead to a few problems. If the form asks for the number of employees, rather than tell a direct lie answer along the the lines of "the Deezeeboy team comprises ......"

I was down a couple of weeks ago for week end of pressure washing and antifouling and noticed some signs campaigning to save a pub in Cawsand/Kingsand presumably to stop conversion to residential. There is always a risk in places like that properties are taken over as holiday homes becoming ghost towns out of season with the consequent closure of local businesses which no longer have a local population to serve which causes pubs to shut and so the cycle continues.

Don't blame you, I try and get South of the Tamar as often as possible (and keep a small boat in the shadow of Mount Edgecumbe). Is the Man Engine still doing the rounds of Cornish towns and villages?

Kevin, Well done for challenging this, unless/until more people do the same nothing will change. If you think its bad down your way , you should come up north a bit. In the Peoples Socialist Republic of Nottingham, the local authority is really imaginative in extracting money from tax/ratepayers. They introduced a work place parking levy whereby all employers with more than 10 employees has to pay £400 per parking space available to employees. I know of a firm that leased parking spaces from the council in one of their multi-storey car parks who also had to pay the parking levy on those spaces. It came as a surprise to the council when businesses started relocating. One major company who's site straddled the city council boundary moved their car park a few hundred yards to be outside the city boundary much to the councils outrage. Recently the council has introduced a charge for any private landlord letting property in the city. Each licence costs a few hundred quid and will need to be renewed every 2 years...and the council expects landlords not to pass the costs on to tenants. As for dealing with the pillocks at Data Protection, I received a really nasty letter because I was late with my annual fee. I paid, and asked them to confirm it would be ok for me to sell personal info about clients/suppliers/employees etc providing I sanitised the info to remove names and addresses. The response was instant and threatening. I asked them to explain the difference with what I proposed and what the NHS was doing.....the silence was deafening. ...and dont get me started on the scoundrels at the PRS.....my metamorphosis into Victor Meldrew is almost complete

One potential pitfall with T & Cs is ensuring that they actually form the basis on which your contract with the customer is based. The mistake a lot of companies make is to only put their terms and conditions on the back of their invoice. From a legal perspective an invoice is a post contractual document and so unless your t&cs have been brought to the attention of a new customer beforehand, you should not assume that that is the basis of your contract, normal sale of goods act will apply (but see * below). To be bullet proof, it is safer to send the t&cs to a customer and get a signed acknowledgement AND KEEP IT FILED in case it is needed. Alternatively ensure that your t&cs are included with your quotes and that the quote makes clear that any contract is subject to those terms. This may be relevant if you are selling goods and claiming retention of title to items supplied until they have been paid for. Many ROT claims fail because of an inability to show that the term was incorporated into the contract. * There is an argument that t&cs notified to customers on the back of an invoice can be deemed to govern the contract if there is an established pattern of trading with that customer so you could argue that they were aware of your terms. This does open all sorts of practical problems of proving established pattern of trade etc so it is risky to rely on this.

Well I suppose it depends on the specifics of your businesses and in your circumstances he may have been correct but the legislation is aimed at artificial separation, not to combine different businesses even if they are operating from the same location. Have a read of the HMRC statement of practice here:- https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/statement-of-practice-4-1983/statement-of-practice-4-1983 A key paragraph in this document reads as follows: "Whilst it is true that the new measures focus on the effect rather than the reason for the separation, it must be stressed that their purpose is to counter artificial separation, which results in an avoidance of VAT. HMRC will therefore not aggregate businesses unless they are satisfied that the separation is artificial" If, to use the example in the HMRC publication, a bed and breakfast business was split so one part provided the bed element and another offered the breakfast element, then the artificial nature of the separation is obvious. IMHO if your two businesses had different activities then the question of artificial separation just does not apply, especially if one traded as a limited company and the other as a partnership. Sharing office facilities is irrelevant and does not "combine" two different businesses.

The attack on artificial separation of businesses is to stop someone simply splitting a business in two to stay under the VAT threshold. In the UK it would not stop you from operating different activities as different business, each with its own status and vat threshold. It only gets tricky if the "unrelated" businesses use the same items of equipment or the split of services is artificial. In an arb context, having one business that cuts down trees and another that chips is likely to fall foul of the regs. A soap making business is demonstrably different to an arb business and I doubt the question of artificial separation would be raised.

Read this before parting with any cash. As others have suggested you will be paying someone to give you generic clauses to put on your website. https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr Then click on there links to get the checklist and 12 things to do now. If you have any queries contact the ICO for guidance.

I can recommend http://www.griffithsandarmour.com I use them for my professional indemnity insurance but they offer the full spectrum of insurance products. They will make their recommendations from the various options and explain their choice. They are an extremely professional outfit and clients i have referred to them have also been pleased with the service. For the avoidance of doubt I am not on commission.

If you have a Mac, the best package (imho) is Account Edge (formerly known as MYOB). It is user friendly , simple to use and has inbuilt features which may be useful as the business expands.

According to Wiki, elder trees were referred to as fairy trees https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_sacred_trees

+1 for Leycesteria

Have you checked your government gateway account to check the status of your application or to see if they have sent you a message?

The definition of services deemed to be construction related is quite broad and it really does depend on what you were doing. Tree planting and landscaping as part of forestry management is not a construction activity. Tree planting and landscaping to prepare a site for construction is a construction activity. Guidance is given here:- https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/construction-industry-scheme-cis-340/construction-industry-scheme-a-guide-for-contractors-and-subcontractors-cis-340#appb Look at clause 2.18 (covering construction activities) and 2.19 ( activities that are not construction activities) as well as appendix B (detailed listing of what constitutes construction activities as defined in S74 , Finance Act 2008) although it is probably worth reading the whole thing.

Property income needs to be identified separately from your trading income. There is a separate section in the tax return for property income. Within the property section there is also a separate section for holiday lets because the rules are slightly different , especially if there is an element of personal use. When calculating the amount of tax you may have to pay, dont forget that the changes to the treatment of any BTL mortgage interest are now beginning to bite as the the restrictions on what can be offset take effect.