(Bloomberg) -- Taxes on Britain’s biggest businesses jumped sharply even before Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves increased their burden in last month’s budget.
Auditing firm PwC said Wednesday that a group of the largest companies paid £31.8 billion ($39.9 billion) in direct taxes in the 2023/24 fiscal period, up more than 10% on the previous year. The increase was largely due to the last Conservative government reversing cuts the party has previously made to the rate of corporation tax.
Labour Chancellor Reeves has promised to leave corporation tax unchanged. However, she disappointed many business chiefs by raising employers’ national insurance contributions — a payroll tax — in her October budget, in an attempt to raise £26 billion. NICs made up around a quarter of the direct taxes on big business in 2023/24, PwC said.
Large businesses provided a further £61.5 billion to the UK Treasury through levies that they collected, such as income tax on staff, up 1.8% on the previous year. Both Conservative and Labour ministers have avoided raising taxes directly on voters in recent years, choosing to target businesses instead.
PwC’s survey has been running for two decades and covers 90 of the largest companies in the UK, extrapolated to estimate taxes paid by those in the FTSE 100 stock index and some big private businesses.
“The number of UK business taxes has increased from 22 to 31 over the survey period, with three new taxes introduced within the last two years alone,” said Andy Wiggins, a PwC tax partner.
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