More than 2,000 voters from the three Brighton and Hove constituencies were among the 110,000 people from across the country to petition Parliament about tax changes for the self-employed.
In Brighton Pavilion 902 voters signed the petition urging the Chancellor George Osborne to scrap his proposal to require the self-employed and small businesses to file four tax returns a year.
The figure in Green MP Caroline Lucas’s constituency was bettered only by the 933 signatories in one London constituency, Hackney North and Stoke Newington, represented by Labour MP Diane Abbott.
The seventh highest number of voters to sign the petition – 697 – came from Hove, which is represented by Peter Kyle who spoke during the Commons debate on the petition last week. Caroline Lucas intervened during the debate.
In Brighton Kemptown, represented by the Conservative MP and government whip Simon Kirby, 504 people signed the petition.
The petition, started by small businessman Paul Johnson, said: “George Osborne announced in his autumn statement the plan for self-employed and small businesses to have to file four tax returns a year rather than one as currently is done.
“Each self-employed individual and small business will have the added burden of additional red tape, accountancy fees and potential for fines.
“As a small business owner myself I already spend quite some time to get things in order once a year.
“There will be greater chance of errors as well. At the moment we pay £1,200 a year in accountancy fees. This figure will greatly increase.
“The Conservatives are not working for small businesses in bringing in such legislation but adding burden.”
The former Green Party leader of Brighton and Hove City Council, Jason Kitcat, who now works as a micro-business ambassador for Hove online accountancy Crunch Accounting, interviewed Peter Kyle last week.
