In tax terms, little or no news is usually good news when evaluating a budget, so in this sense Alf Cannan’s 2018 Manx Budget was mostly good news.

Industry does not react well to constant changes to tax rates and regimes and it was gratifying that the Treasury Minister largely left these well alone.

Of course we may have to make changes in due course to satisfy the EU’s ’substance’ requirements but that’s for another day.

There was, of course, one major development - from April 6 we’ll be able to create or switch to new-style pension schemes under which the entirety of the funds can be accessed at any time after retirement.

A 40% lump sum can be paid tax-free, with the rest taxed as income as and when it’s taken.

Expect to see a fleet of Lamborghinis take to the island’s roads shortly! The restriction of tax relief to £50,000 of contributions will, however, be disappointing to very high earners (and in reality unlikely to save the public purse much tax).

I noted also the introduction of a measure which will deem company loan repayments to come from distributable reserves if they relate to a previous sale of shares (or goodwill) to the company.

This was not surprising - the existing, very general, anti-avoidance rule has been a challenge to implement and it’s been well chronicled that the Assessor’s office feels there has been some abuse.

But it’s to be hoped that the new rule does not unwittingly catch those genuine commercial situations which the old rule respected.

For full coverage of the Budget, see today’s Manx Independent.

Next week’s Isle of Man Examiner will include more commentary.