Why have a capital gains tax allowance

Not if it is their only home.

So someone who has spent their working life paying a mortgage, with an income on or just above the personal allowance, who then has to sell the house in order to invest the funds to provide an income to pay for nursing home fees should pay a high rate of capital gains tax because they made a profit on their home? For most people, even of "modest means" , their home is their main asset.

I am not against "people of modest means" being given help M0nica - just the opposite - but it is currently not a level playing field for all.

If someone "impoverished" is getting income from "some unconsidered trifle" (seems unlikely that anyone who is poor would have not considered every bit of income but I'll go with this thought ) they would be able - in my scheme - to set it against their personal allowance as the personal allowance is now nearly the same (it needs to go up just a little bit more) as "poverty level". If they are poor they would have not used any of this. They cannot be poor or it must be a very large amount if it took them into higher rate income tax. Also, don't forget that my suggestion would/should lead to lower rates of tax for all.

We have a tax free income allowance, why not a capital gains tax allowance? It is not that large and most people do not treat capital gains as an addition to income but an addition to their savings. The majority people benefitting from CGT are people of modest means who have sold some item they possess or have a small investment in a company that is bought out. Quite a number of people have shares in an employer who gave employees shares as part of a profit related scheme. or who took part in a save-as-you-earn scheme to buy shares in their employing company.

It would be very hard on someone impoverished who suddenly finds that some unconsidered trifle they possessed was valuable to find when they sold it that almost all the gain goes to the tax man in higher rate income tax.

If anyone buys and sells assets as a business, rather than a windfall gain ( the art dealer as distinct from someone who just sells a picture hanging on their wall) that capital gain is taxed as income as it dows form their income.