Autumn Statement sees changes to venture capital schemes

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Autumn Statement sees changes to venture capital schemes

Chancellor George Osborne made changes to eligible investments for venture capital schemes, confirming the excluded activities for VCT, EIS and SEIS.

In his Autumn Statement speech to the House of Commons he said: “The provision of reserve energy generating capacity and the generation of renewable energy benefiting from other government support by community energy organisations will no longer be qualifying activities, from the end of November.”

In addition, these activities will not be eligible for Social Investment Tax Relief when it is enlarged.

The government will exclude all remaining energy generation activities from the schemes from 6 April 2016, as well as from the enlarged Social Investment Tax Relief, and will also introduce increased flexibility for replacement capital within EIS and VCT, subject to state aids approval, as set out in the Finance Bill 2016.

The government vowed to expand support for Social Impact Bonds, investing £105m over the parliament to help deal with issues including homelessness, poor mental health and youth unemployment.

The Office for Civil Society will continue to provide a range of support to the UK’s third sector, but it will reduce its headcount and widen the availability of Social Impact Bonds.