Clause 16
Finance (No. 2) Bill
9:30 am
John Healey (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Wentworth, Labour)
I have explained the purpose of the clause, referring to it in my remarks on clause 9. Its material effect is to align section 23 of the Value Added Tax Act 1994 with schedule 9 to that Act and therefore give full legal effect to a situation that has been in place administratively since 6 December.
The clause also allows us to amend the meaning of “games of chance” by Treasury order. We will do that later this year to ensure that both section 23 and schedule 9 take account of the definition of a “game of chance” that is contained in the Gambling Act. We have further work to do both with the industry and internally on pinning down that definition. That is why we propose to do it by Treasury order later this year, rather than now. I commend the clause to the Committee.