Non-domicile Status

Baroness Kramer Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Livermore (Lab)]

I am very grateful to the noble Lord, as always, for mentioning the £22 billion black hole. He mentions lost revenue. I remember the noble Lord telling me when my party was in opposition that our policy on non-doms would not raise any revenue, but in fact cost money. Just a few weeks after that, his Government performed a screeching U-turn and scored over £20 billion by implementing our policy, when they adopted it as their own. He was mistaken then, and I am very confident that he is mistaken now. The costings certified by the OBR for the previous Government’s and this Government’s reforms account for a potential behavioural response. But I do not recognise at all the figures that the noble Lord gives, which are purely speculative.

[Baroness Kramer (LD)]

My Lords, dropping the changes anticipated to the non-dom regime would not be fair to UK-domiciled taxpayers and to UK public finances. However, it is also wrong if those who have come from abroad to work here end up paying double taxation. Have the Government looked to update the UK’s tax treaties, which are meant to eliminate double taxation but currently fall short in significant areas, especially with complex tax countries such as the USA? Would he agree that it is not just a fairness issue? Sorting the many discrepancies would encourage many productive people to remain who are currently either leaving or considering leaving.

[Lord Livermore (Lab)]

I am very grateful to the noble Baroness for her question. To be clear, we are not dropping any reforms; we are making sure that they are working as intended, and we are trying to make the system as simple as possible to use so that those people are able to come to our country and invest in it. The noble Baroness asked about double taxation conventions. The Chancellor has been very clear that the reforms to the taxation of non-domiciled individuals do not affect the UK’s existing double taxation conventions, and we do not intend to change those treaties.