Budget 2010

So now we know where we stand with regards to the budget and we can begin to look at the impact on Schoolwear.. The SA are extremely pleased that we did not witness the end of the zero rating of children’s clothing and footwear for VAT purposes, which was much debated in recent weeks. Thank you to those who have given up their time to help us communicate our VAT message to politicians ahead of The Budget.

As you are aware we have campaigned heavily to reduce VAT on upper badged items to 5%…this rate is the best that we can hope for on garments which are clearly schoolwear and could not be mistaken for anything else. We made some progress with our discussions with the previous government, gaining the support of many M.Ps and we shall redouble our work with the new regime. We would like to think that our lobbying of George Osborne has had some impact and certainly we have been spared what we all feared the most.

 Back to School 2010 will not now be disrupted by uncertainty for which we are very grateful, and we now know that we face a 20% VAT rate from 4th January 2011. It will certainly have an impact on our businesses but we should hope that we will not face any further changes for the duration of this government.

 We will be refreshing our “Untax our Teens” campaign, and our work will continue to focus on the fact that full VAT on school clothing which is deemed to fit a 14-year old and above is a tax on education which cannot be justified.

 Expect to see us at The Schoolwear Show in October, we would welcome your continued support of our efforts, and ask you to put the 17th October in your diary for our “Hollywood Nights” fund raising extravaganza. We shall be sending out details shortly but it is a chance to relax a little, while helping us to raise much needed funds to continue this work.