Power generators in the UK are watching with interest a call from industry bosses urging the government to delay for a year the introduction of the climate change levy, the tax on business energy use due to be implemented next April. The call comes from the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), whose director general, Digby Jones, said business leaders wanted amendments to the controversial tax proposals in order to address concerns over the terms and scope of the rebate scheme. Jones said he was to urge the chancellor, Gordon Brown, to delay the levy’s implementation until April 2002 to allow a full reassessment of its potential impact on business.
In his March 2000 budget, the chancellor sought to deflect a row with business leaders, with whom the new tax is unpopular, by offering rebates of up to 80 per cent to energy intensive industries that reach an agreement with the government by next month to undertake pollution reducing measures in the first 10 years of the scheme’s operation. But some firms are concerned that they will be unable to meet the October deadline. Business chiefs believe the tax is unfair in its current form, and fails to recognise the efforts of industries that have invested in clean technologies. They are unhappy with the scope of exemptions from the tax, and want a change to the rules of which industries will, and which will not be eligible for rebates. Currently, plants that are not regulated under the European Union’s Integrated Pollution Prevention Control rules are excluded.
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