SLI forecast springs budget surprises

Standard Life Investments says in its review of Budgets since Labour came to power in 1997 that business taxes are unlikely to go up this year because of existing pressures on the economy and that the really difficult decisions on taxation and government spending may be put off until after the next general election, expected by 2005. The reason that business taxes may fall is that the government is aware of the danger of increasing the taxation pressure on an already weakened economy, and will find that borrowing more money to fund public spending will be the less painful option. ...