HMRC has published a Freedom of Information release confirming that, as at 13 May 2022, it had seven live investigations into corporate criminal offences of the failure to prevent the facilitation of tax evasion.
Those new offences were brought into effect in the Criminal Finances Act 2017 on 30 September 2017 and are applicable to organisations that fail to prevent the facilitation of tax evasion from that date.
The figures show that HMRC has a further 21 live ‘opportunities’ under review and has so far rejected another 69. The information release notes that the investigations and potential investigations span 11 different business sectors and ‘sit across all HMRC customer groups’, including accountancy and legal services.
HMRC also notes that investigations ‘are not the sole measure of success’ with the aim of the legislation being to change behaviours and encourage organisations to put preventative procedures in place to reduce the opportunity for facilitation in the first place.
HMRC also publishes separate guidance on the facilitation offences.
Writing on LinkedIn, Charlie Clifford Evans, Tax Risk and Governance Leader at RSM UK, suggests the relatively low number of investigations indicates a high bar for HMRC to obtain a successful criminal prosecution (so far, no cases have gone to court).
There are two facilitation offences. The first applies to the facilitation of UK tax evasion, and the second to the facilitation of foreign tax evasion.
HMRC has published a Freedom of Information release confirming that, as at 13 May 2022, it had seven live investigations into corporate criminal offences of the failure to prevent the facilitation of tax evasion.
Those new offences were brought into effect in the Criminal Finances Act 2017 on 30 September 2017 and are applicable to organisations that fail to prevent the facilitation of tax evasion from that date.
The figures show that HMRC has a further 21 live ‘opportunities’ under review and has so far rejected another 69. The information release notes that the investigations and potential investigations span 11 different business sectors and ‘sit across all HMRC customer groups’, including accountancy and legal services.
HMRC also notes that investigations ‘are not the sole measure of success’ with the aim of the legislation being to change behaviours and encourage organisations to put preventative procedures in place to reduce the opportunity for facilitation in the first place.
HMRC also publishes separate guidance on the facilitation offences.
Writing on LinkedIn, Charlie Clifford Evans, Tax Risk and Governance Leader at RSM UK, suggests the relatively low number of investigations indicates a high bar for HMRC to obtain a successful criminal prosecution (so far, no cases have gone to court).
There are two facilitation offences. The first applies to the facilitation of UK tax evasion, and the second to the facilitation of foreign tax evasion.
