Report on VAT

Tax experts looking at VAT as part of a report for the Institute for Fiscal Studies have called for VAT to be simplified with one rate and almost no exceptions. The submission is part of the Mirrlees Review of the tax system which is currently being undertaken by Sir James Mirrlees, a Nobel prize winning economist.

The Crosby Report

Yesterday Sir James Crosby’s interim report to the Government on options for improving the function of mortgage finance markets was published. The report van be found on the Treasury website and many of the newspapers today had articles on this including The Times, The Telegraph, and the FT.

New journals received

The new issue of both Director and Company Reporting have been received today. Director has a special report on flexible working. This includes an article on flexible working in small businesses; one on on enterprise 2.0: collaborative knowledge management or social networking for business; and, one on the increase of web-based applications for business and cloud computing. Company Reporting looks at how recent annual reports address a number of issues including pension surplus; impairment reversal; share-based payments and financial instrument disclosures.

New books received

We have received a number of new books in the last week which may be of interest to users of the service. These focus on 'soft' management skills rather than technical skills.

Firstly, "Total Leadership: be a better reader, have a richer life" by Stewart D. Friedman, which is published by Harvard Business Press. It looks at improving performance in work and no-work time at the same time by identifying your core values. The books contains more than thirty hands-on tools.

Also received recently is "NLP at work: the difference that makes a difference in business" by Sue Knight. It looks at how the Neuro Linguistic Programming at work can help accelerate learning, creativity, communication, influence and impact.

Finally, the third edition of "A Career in your suitcase" by Jo Parfitt is a practical book which looks at how to have a portable, flexible career you love.

To borrow any of these books please contact the Information Service.