Mr. John Mark Taylorasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer to what rate the standard charge of value added tax could be reduced in order to achieve the same yield as now if all exemptions, zero rating and exclusions were removed.
§ Mr. BrookeFor legal and technical reasons it would not be possible to charge value added tax on all exempt, zero-rated or excluded items. However, just over a half of all consumers' expenditure is subject to value added tax at the standard rate. If the tax were to apply to all consumers' expenditure, the rate could by definition be roughly halved to achieve the same revenue yield as now.