When there was a big reform of SDLT in December 2014, the measures took effect at midnight on the day of announcement because we were worried about the consequences of any delay on the market. https://twitter.com/HelenMiller_IFS/status/1280078256952221697">https://twitter.com/HelenMill...
This created a bit of a Parliamentary problem because we needed to pass an SI on the day after the Autumn Statement but we couldn& #39;t announce that there& #39;d be an SI on the floor of the House until after the Autumn Statement (announcing the SDLT reforms) had been delivered.
It was my job to go and see Speaker Bercow in advance of the Autumn Statement to say that we needed Parliamentary time on Thursday to pass an SI on a subject matter that I couldn& #39;t tell him about and that we couldn& #39;t tell anyone that we were even doing an SI until Wednesday.