Despite no further increases to Insurance Premium Tax (IPT) in yesterday’s Budget, we’re joining with our trade association, The Association of Medical Insurers and Intermediaries (AMII) to launch a campaign to raise public awareness about the impact of IPT on healthcare.
Stuart Scullion, the chairman of AMII said:
“Increases in IPT affect the NHS as much as the Private Health sector.”
In recent budgets IPT has become the government’s favourite “stealth” tax. You’ll no doubt have noticed the increases filtering through on your various insurance premiums.
In some other countries health insurance premiums are completely exempt from taxation whilst in the UK IPT has been creeping up. If premiums became unaffordable and policies are cancelled then the overstretched NHS could be forced to shoulder even more of the demand for medical services as people move away from the private sector.
We feel this is short sighted. As the Treasury salivates at the prospect of the extra funds flowing into it’s coffers the NHS will scream for even more cash. In his latest budget Phillip Hammond allocated an extra £425million to the NHS.
Scullion continued:
“The Chancellor has a responsibility to liaise with the Dept. of Health to ascertain the total impact of increases in IPT in terms of revenue raised versus cost to the NHS. I suspect the results would make interesting reading.”
“At the forthcoming AMII AGM we will announce our action plan to raise public awareness about the impact of IPT increases on healthcare with the launch of an IPT Parliamentary Petition. We need the support of everyone within the health and well-being sector to get behind the initiative, starting by attending the forthcoming AGM on 22 March.”
“AMII has a responsibility to lobby Government in the interests of pointing out the folly of these actions”.
