Online marketplaces such as Amazon and eBay could find themselves held liable for VAT fraud committed by non-compliant sellers in some circumstances, as a result of new measures outlined in the Budget designed to crack down on VAT evasion by overseas online sellers, which the Treasury estimates is costing between £1bn and £1.5bn a year in lost tax revenues

Around 2,000 small businesses will benefit from the uprating of the VAT registration and deregistration thresholds announced in the Budget, which have been increased in line with inflation

There is good news for classic car owners in this year’s Budget, as the government is to introduce legislation to put the exemption from Vehicle Excise Duty (VED) for older cars on a permanent basis, so that from 1 April each year vehicles constructed more than 40 years before the 1 January of that year will automatically be exempt from paying the tax