Oh Darling

In an interview with the Financial Times, the new Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alistair Darling, has stated the government is ruling out any immediate changes in response to the recent concerns expressed over the taxation of private equity and foreigners.

Whilst this will, doubtless, upset the campaigners for fairness and justice, many others will find reassurance in the the Chancellor's assertion that "we should be very, very wary, indeed of a knee-jerk reaction ... making a tax change that could result in unintended consequences and sometimes undesirable consequences".

The general tone of Mr Darling's comments and, in particular, his reference to the damage caused to the US economy through Sarbannes-Oxley, suggests to us that the non-dom issue will be left unaltered for fear of any tax changes running the risk of damagaing the UK's competitiveness in attracting mobile money.

Other changes, particularly to the capital gains tax taper relief code, must still be likely but there seems to be little prospect now of any changes being announced or enacted until the Chanecllor delivers his pre-Budget report in December 2007.

The transcript of the interview can be read here.