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There is currently a consultation underway on what the government is calling "False Self Employment in Construction". It's aimed at stopping what they see as exploitation of a self employed tax loophole used by construction contractors who should actually be classed as employees.

This consultation is particularly relevant to contractors because what they are proposing could effectively remove self employment as a payment option for many construction workers. The issues that have everyone concerned are the criteria that qualify contractors for self employment. Under the proposed system a contractor would have to supply either: Plant or Heavy equipment for the job, or all materials required for the job, or workers for the job.

As you can imagine this rules out probably 90% of the people currently working as self employed contractors in construction, and I think we can all agree that the criteria are far too limiting. All feedback needs to be in by the 12th of October, and we are led to understand that any changes that may be implemented will be delayed until after the recession - so there is some silver lining.

We will be submitting our responses via Penningtons and KPMG in the near future, but in the meantime we'd like to know your feelings on the matter, you can just click Hugo below to send us an email. If you feel we can possibly assist in any other way please let us know.

Hugo
14/08/2009