ETASSUM52150 | Enterprise Management Incentives (EMI): Excluded activities: Shipbuilding, coal and steel production

Paragraphs 20A, 20B & 20C, Schedule 5 of the Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003 (ITEPA)

Shipbuilding, producing coal and producing steel became excluded activities from 21 July 2008. Options granted before that date by companies that engaged in these activities were unaffected by the change.

Shipbuilding means the building of self propelled seagoing commercial vehicles. To meet that definition vessels have to have permanent propulsion and “all the characteristics of self navigation on the high seas”.

Shipbuilding companies which can qualify for EMI:

Vessels of less than 100 gross tonnes (or tugs of less than 365KW) are not covered by this exclusion. And because they are not seagoing vessels, neither are vessels built for use on inland waterways. Military vessels and large private yachts are also not excluded as they are not commercial vessels.

Ship repairing or conversion is not regarded as shipbuilding, so those activities are not excluded.

Producing coal includes the production, winning and extraction of it as well as consequential activities such as washing, sizing, sorting and transporting coal to the point of delivery. The transport or warehousing of steel and the manufacture of finished products from steel are not excluded activities.