Tory peer Flight calls for capital gains tax cut

A Conservative peer has urged the coalition to cut capital gains tax (CGT), arguing it discourages savings and investment and damages growth.

In a paper issued by the Centre for Policy Studies, Lord Howard Flight said there is "no excuse" not to cut CGT immediately to about 25% from its current level of 28%, adding a deeper cut to 15% would "clearly make economic sense". Co-written by Oliver Latham, an Oxford political economics PhD student, the paper sets out how even the Treasury's own analysis shows that, once the 45p top rate of income tax comes into effect next year, the 28% rate will raise less revenue than a lower rate. Lord Flight, the former chairman of Investec who co-founded Guinness Flight in the 80's before it ...