Finance Bill — Clause 200 — Tax on Bankers' Bonuses — 17 Apr 2013 at 19:00

Stewart Jackson MP, Peterborough voted against consideration of a new tax on bankers' bonuses.

The majority of MPs voted against requiring the Chancellor to consider reinstating a tax on bankers' bonuses. Such a tax, known formally as a "bank payroll tax" was levied as a one-off in 2009[1]. During the debate clarity was sought as to if the proposal was for another one-off tax or to re-introduce it on a permanent basis[2]; the response was that it was certainly a proposal to reintroduce it for the current financial year and that policies for the future would be set our in the next general election manifesto[3].

MPs were considering the Finance Bill[4][5]; the text of the rejected amendment which was the subject of this vote stated:

  • I beg to move amendment 2, page 118, line 22, at end add—
  • (14) The Chancellor of the Exchequer shall review the possibility of incorporating a bank payroll tax within the bank levy and publish a report, within six months of the passing of this Act, on how additional revenue raised would be invested to create new jobs and tackle unemployment.’.

Had it been approved this amendment would have added the above new section at the end of clause 200[6] of the Bill which deals with the rates of the Bank levy.

The Bank levy itsself is provided for by Schedule 19 of the Finance Act 2011[7]; it raises a tax on banks based on their total applicable liabilities and equities.

The chancellor announced, and immediately brought in, a the tax on bankers' bonuses in his pre-budget report speech on the 9th of December 2009[8]; he said:

  • I have decided to introduce from today a special one-off levy of 50 per cent. on any individual discretionary bonus above £25,000. This will be paid by the bank, not the bank employee, and anti-avoidance measures will be introduced with immediate effect.

The bank payroll tax was introduced into law by Section 22 of the Finance Act 2010[9]; Schedule 1 of that Act[10] set the rate of the bank payroll tax at 50% which applied to bank bonuses exceeding £25,000. This legislation was agreed in the ‘wash up’ period before the Dissolution of the House prior to the 2010 general election so was not debated or voted on by MPs.

Debate in Parliament | Source |

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Party Summary

Votes by party, red entries are votes against the majority for that party.

What is Tell? '+1 tell' means that in addition one member of that party was a teller for that division lobby.

What are Boths? An MP can vote both aye and no in the same division. The boths page explains this.

What is Turnout? This is measured against the total membership of the party at the time of the vote.

PartyMajority (No)Minority (Aye)BothTurnout
Con251 (+1 tell) 0082.6%
DUP0 3037.5%
Green0 10100.0%
Lab0 220 (+2 tell)086.4%
LDem43 (+1 tell) 0077.2%
PC0 2066.7%
SDLP0 2066.7%
SNP0 60100.0%
Total:294 234083.1%

Rebel Voters - sorted by party

MPs for which their vote in this division differed from the majority vote of their party. You can see all votes in this division, or every eligible MP who could have voted in this division

Sort by: Name | Constituency | Party | Vote

NameConstituencyPartyVote
no rebellions

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