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Modernising the UK's direct tax law has taken another step forward, as two new draft bills rewriting corporation tax and international tax legislation were published by the Tax Law Rewrite project.

Announcing the Bills, Financial Secretary to the Treasury, Stephen Timms MP, said:

"These two Bills will complete the task of rewriting the majority of direct tax legislation for individuals and businesses that started in 1996.

Thanks to the close co-operation between the project team, tax practitioners, the legal profession and business representatives the project has once again rewritten tax legislation in a clearer and more accessible format."

The Bills rewrite the law without changing its general effect and have wide support amongst the tax community. Key features are:

• the Corporation Tax Bill (the second of two dealing with corporation tax) will substantially complete the rewrite of the corporation tax code. It includes provisions about losses and gifts to charities, various reliefs such as group relief, distributions, particular types of companies and activities, avoidance, and definitions;
• The Taxation (International and Other Provisions) Bill includes provisions about double taxation relief, transfer pricing, advance pricing agreements and tax arbitrage. It also relocates and where appropriate rewrites some provisions which would otherwise have been left unhelpfully in the Income and Corporation Taxes Act or one of the Finance Acts.

HMRC have also published consultation stage Impact Assessments (IAs) on the costs and benefits arising from the new rewrite Bills and would welcome any comments.

Copies of the draft Bills and the IAs are on the Internet at http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/rewrite.