HC Deb 03 July 1923 vol 166 c296

(3) Where an assurance company carries on both ordinary life assurance business and industrial life assurance business, the business of each such class shall for the purposes of the Income Tax Acts be treated as though it were a separate business, and Section thirty-three of the Income Tax Act, 1918, shall apply separately to each such class of business.

Sir H. CRAIK

I beg to move, at the end of the Clause, to insert a new Subsection— (4) For the purpose of removing doubts it is hereby declared that a mutual assurance company carrying on life assurance business is entitled to relief under Section thirty-three of the Income Tax Act, 1918, in the same manner and to the same extent as if the business of the company were the business of a proprietary assurance company, and the provisions of this Section shall be construed accordingly. I move this Amendment, in place of my right hon. Friend the Member for the Aston Division (Sir E. Cecil). It is designed to remedy what is an obvious injustice to these particular assurance societies, and to encourage them in their work. The Amendment explains itself, and I ask the right hon. Gentleman to accept it, in order to put right a very obvious injustice.

Sir W. JOYNSON-HICKS

This is really only a clearing up Amendment. The Department has for some time administered the law in accordance with the Amendment, on the assumption that the Income Tax Act, 1918, really meant what it implies. In order, however, that there should be no mistake or doubt as to whether they were acting correctly, we thought that this Clause had better be accepted. We put it before the Association of Life Offices, and they asked us to accept it. It is a correct Clause, and follows out the existing interpretation of the law during the last two years.

Amendment agreed to.