Congratulations to the government and Inland Revenue for bureaucracy gone mad.

Was there really anything wrong with stamps form 61 and the PD form? Could there not have been relatively straight-forward legislation to impose a statutory obligation on purchasers to make the return (and pay the stamp duty by a particular date)?

There will not be many conveyancers who will have the courage to increase the fee to their clients by the requisite margin just to complete stamp duty land tax 1 forms - never mind the two or three supple-mental forms that are sometimes required.

John Bott, The Bott Partnership, Rustington