# Charity launches petition for VAT rebate on Tommies figures

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/2018/10/16/charity-launches-petition-vat-rebate-tommies-figures/
- Published: 2018-10-16T14:45:24+01:00
- Author: Melanie May

**A petition on Change.org asking for a VAT rebate on Remembered’s There Not There
Tommy figurines has now reached over 100,000 signatures.**

[Remembered](https://www.therebutnotthere.org.uk/) is selling the ‘There But Not
There’ ‘Tommies’ [online](https://www.therebutnotthere.org.uk/) to raise funds for
six military charities including Walking with the Wounded, Project Equinox, and 
Help for Heroes. As well as the life-size six-foot aluminium silhouette, there are
30cm tabletop Perspex Tommies, silhouettes for benches and chairs, name blocks, 
a pin badge, and stickers available.** **

The campaign [started this Spring](https://fundraising.co.uk/2018/03/07/ghostly-ww1-figures-art-campaign-to-aims-to-raise-15m-for-charities/),
as the 2018 Armistice project for the charity to educate people about the WW1 soldiers
who sacrificed their lives in the war and to commemorate the fallen. So far, sales
have raised nearly £4m for the charities, but because the Tommies are technically
classed as merchandise, £800,000 of this money has had to be paid in tax to HM Revenue&
Customs, making it the single largest beneficiary of the fundraising initiative.

## Advertisement

 

> Currently HMRC will receive more money from the [#ThereButNotThere](https://twitter.com/hashtag/ThereButNotThere?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)
> campaign than we will as beneficiaries. We would like [@PhilipHammondUK](https://twitter.com/PhilipHammondUK?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)
> to return the VAT to ensure the money goes where it's needed most. Sign the petition
> ⬇️ [#TommyVAT](https://twitter.com/hashtag/TommyVAT?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)@
> Remembered2018 [https://t.co/VGjX35mA1i](https://t.co/VGjX35mA1i)
> — Help for Heroes (@HelpforHeroes) [October 12, 2018](https://twitter.com/HelpforHeroes/status/1050649772682559489?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)

 

Remembered has launched [the petition](https://www.change.org/p/help-the-armed-forces-charity-there-but-not-there-reclaim-the-vat-on-the-sale-of-commemorative-tommies-ensuring-that-the-taxman-isn-t-the-largest-beneficiary)
to the Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond to ask for a rebate on the VAT
paid. There is a precedent: George Osborne waived more than £1m in VAT from the 
sales of the ceramic Remembrance Day poppies that were displayed at the Tower of
London back in 2014. Other rebates have also been given, including to The Band Aid
Trust, which received back £2m in 2005, while VAT was also refunded on sales of 
Band Aid’s [30th anniversary single in 2015](https://fundraising.co.uk/2014/11/16/treasury-waive-vat-sales-band-aid-30/).

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