Open letter to the Chancellor - Cash ISAs

Open letter to the Chancellor highlighting the importance of retaining the Cash ISA limit

Dear Chancellor 

We are writing to express our concern regarding recent speculation about cuts to Cash ISA subscription limits. 

Cash ISAs are a cornerstone of personal savings for millions across the UK, helping people from all walks of life to build financial resilience and achieve their savings goals. 

Beyond their personal benefits, Cash ISAs play a vital role in the broader economy. The funds deposited in these accounts support lending, helping to keep mortgages and loans affordable and accessible. Any significant reductions to the Cash ISA limits would make this funding more scarce which could have the knock-on effect of making loans to households and businesses more expensive and harder to come by. This would undermine efforts to stimulate economic growth, including the Government’s commitment to delivering 1.5 million new homes.  

Cutting the Cash ISA limit would send a discouraging message to savers, who are sensibly trying to plan for the future and undermine a product that has stood the test of time. It would make the whole ISA regime more complex and make it harder for people to transfer money between cash and investments. 

Restricting Cash ISAs won’t encourage people to invest, as it won’t suddenly change their appetite to take on risk.  

We know that barriers to investing are primarily behavioural, therefore building confidence and awareness are far more important. There are opportunities to capitalise on the transformational changes to the advice-guidance boundary and to look again at risk warnings so that they encourage and reassure rather than scare people off investing. And we know that Cash ISAs themselves also act as a gateway to Stocks & Shares ISAs. 

We also call for a long-term consumer awareness and information campaign to educate people about the benefits of investing, alongside maintaining strong support for saving.  

We therefore urge you to affirm your support for Cash ISAs by maintaining the current £20,000 limit. Preserving this threshold will enable households to continue building financial security while supporting broader economic stability and growth.  

Ends
 

If your organisation would like to be added to the list of signatories please contact pressoffice@bsa.org.uk