Bill Dodwell, head of Tax Policy at Deloitte said: "Today the Chancellor produced a Budget focussed on savers, with additional funds devoted to bingo players and drinkers.

"Increasing the ISA limit to £15,000 from 1 July 2014 – and merging cash ISAs and stocks and shares ISAs will help millions of savers and reduce administration for the fund management industry. Removing tax from a greater level of ISA cash savings helps counter-act the impact of low interest rates – but the Exchequer cost of the measure will naturally increase as interest rates rise. This will cost £80 million next year, rising up to £230 million and then £325 million.

"The proposed changes to defined contribution pensions – which now cover 13 million people – will help individuals manage their own savings more effectively. It is good to see that the Government is providing funds to help prospective pensioners with advice to cover the much wider range of choices. From 2015, it will no longer be necessary to take an annuity (relying on drawdown instead) and there will be some earlier relaxations from 27 March. The 25% tax-free cash lump sum is retained but from April 2015 withdrawals in excess of this amount will be taxed at marginal rate, instead of the penal 55% rate applying currently. There will be consultation about how to extend some of the reliefs to defined benefit schemes.

"The main avoidance measure will be the new requirement for users of tax schemes to pay up front tax as if they had not undertaken the scheme. This takes effect from Royal Assent and is an acceleration of cash payments rather than an absolute increase in taxation. HMRC win far more cases than they lose, when they litigate tax avoidance schemes. This is estimated to bring in £4 billion over five years.

"The main business tax measure is the boosting of the annual investment allowance – currently £250,000 per annum in the two years from January 2013 – to £500,000 from 1 April 2014-31 December 2015. This allows businesses to get immediate tax relief on investments in plant and equipment. Whilst the relief is welcome, constantly changing this relief is complicated to understand and may not have quite the beneficial effect intended.

"Business will also note the Chancellor's commitment to bring into effect quickly the proposals on internationals tax changes coming from the OECD. The first five actions in the Base Erosion and Profit Shifting project are due for approval in September 2015.

"The increase in the personal allowance to £10,500 from April 2015 has been well flagged and it will be worth £100 to a basic rate taxpayer and £184 to a higher rate taxpayer – with a small cut from those earning over £100,000 who see the allowance withdrawn.

"Overall, this Budget is a modest giveaway of some £500+ million, in the context of forecast taxes of over £600 billion."

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