British government increases planned rate of levy on banks

The UK government has upped the rate of its planned tax on Britain's banks, draft legislation revealed today.

The British Treasury outlined in today's draft Finance Bill 2011 that it will increase the rate from an initially proposed 0.04% to 0.05% in its first year from January 1, 2011 and up from 0.07% to 0.075% in subsequent years.