For too long, governments have avoided fundamental changes to tax, tinkering only with the rates of existing taxes, rather than conducting a root and branch review of the system.

As the government conducts fundamental reviews as part of its economic recovery plans, now is the time to rethink what taxes are for, including what is taxed and why.

This first report for our TransformTax project, supported by the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust, outlines three changes to VAT that can be made relatively easily in the near term. We believe they should be made soon to begin the long overdue process of embedding environmental and social benefits in the tax system.