Emma Chamberlain

Spear’s Review                               

You probably haven’t heard of Emma Chamberlain; not many tax barristers are household names. But this is one who may become more familiar before too long.

It’s true that Chamberlain has already been appointed an OBE, and that the work she does from Pump Court Chambers has earned her a reputation as one of the leading legal minds for inheritance and capital gains tax matters. She is also a visiting professor at Oxford University and the LSE International Inequalities Unit, not to mention a frequent contributor to publications such as Tax Journal and British Tax Review. But it is her work on the prospect of a wealth tax that may soon raise Chamberlain’s profile.

In 2020, along with economists Arun Advani and Andy Summers, Chamberlain set up the Wealth Tax Commission with support from the LSE and the University of Warwick. Together the trio published a report on the topic of a UK wealth tax, which assessed whether it would be ‘desirable and deliverable’. (In short, the authors believe it would.) Calling on testimony from thousands of experts from across the political and economic spectrum, the report also included findings and projections regarding how much such a tax would raise, how much it would cost to administer, and what the likely economic and social consequences would be.

A large group of MPs on the Labour left have called explicitly for a wealth tax, despite Keir Starmer’s reluctance to commit to specific tax plans. Opinion polls, meanwhile, show that around 75 per cent of the public support a tax on wealth over £10 million.

Whether one agrees or not with its content or recommendations, Chamberlain’s report does present a credible set of options for wealth-tax-minded Treasury staff. Should it come to pass, she may be a more influential figure on the finances of UK-based HNWs than anyone else in recent history.