HMRC staff were set to strike today in protest against job cuts. Tax offices would be closed, and calls to telephone enquiry lines would go unanswered, the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) said last Thursday.
HMRC staff were set to strike today in protest against job cuts. Tax offices would be closed, and calls to telephone enquiry lines would go unanswered, the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) said last Thursday. HMRC said today that it would do everything it could do to maintain services to the public.
Last month the union reported that there was a 33.3% turnout in a ballot on industrial action, and 52.8% of the 18,300 voters had backed a strike.
In a reference to David Cameron’s condemnation last week of aggressive tax avoidance schemes, PCS said that as well as ‘wringing their hands’ about the morality of avoidance, ministers ‘have the power to do something about it, starting with an immediate halt to the job cuts’.
Plans to cut a further 10,000 HMRC jobs would ‘seriously undermine’ efforts to clamp down on aggressive tax avoidance, it said.
The strike was also ‘in opposition to creeping privatisation in HMRC, as the department is currently spending £4m on a year-long trial using two private companies to handle tax credit enquiries’.
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: ‘It is sickening to see millionaires in the cabinet wringing their hands about the immorality of tax avoidance when it is their lack of political will to act that means we lose tens of billions of pounds every year. The case for investment in our public services as an alternative to austerity could not be more obvious than it is in HMRC. Yet the government wants to cut 10,000 more jobs from the department, letting the wealthy tax dodgers off the hook and punishing the rest of us for a recession we did not cause.’
‘HMRC is disappointed with the decision to strike and will do everything it can to maintain services to the public,’ the department said in a statement.
‘We are seeking dialogue with the PCS to address their concerns and will work to minimise any disruption to our customers. In our 2010 spending review the Government made £917m available to us to tackle avoidance, evasion and fraud. This is being used to increase our tax take from compliance work by £7bn a year in 2014/15 which we are on target to do. Last year alone we increased the yield from our compliance work to £13.9bn.’
PCS said today’s action would be followed by ongoing industrial action short of a strike. Staff would refuse to do overtime ‘used to mask the effect of staffing cuts’.
HMRC staff were set to strike today in protest against job cuts. Tax offices would be closed, and calls to telephone enquiry lines would go unanswered, the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) said last Thursday.
HMRC staff were set to strike today in protest against job cuts. Tax offices would be closed, and calls to telephone enquiry lines would go unanswered, the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) said last Thursday. HMRC said today that it would do everything it could do to maintain services to the public.
Last month the union reported that there was a 33.3% turnout in a ballot on industrial action, and 52.8% of the 18,300 voters had backed a strike.
In a reference to David Cameron’s condemnation last week of aggressive tax avoidance schemes, PCS said that as well as ‘wringing their hands’ about the morality of avoidance, ministers ‘have the power to do something about it, starting with an immediate halt to the job cuts’.
Plans to cut a further 10,000 HMRC jobs would ‘seriously undermine’ efforts to clamp down on aggressive tax avoidance, it said.
The strike was also ‘in opposition to creeping privatisation in HMRC, as the department is currently spending £4m on a year-long trial using two private companies to handle tax credit enquiries’.
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: ‘It is sickening to see millionaires in the cabinet wringing their hands about the immorality of tax avoidance when it is their lack of political will to act that means we lose tens of billions of pounds every year. The case for investment in our public services as an alternative to austerity could not be more obvious than it is in HMRC. Yet the government wants to cut 10,000 more jobs from the department, letting the wealthy tax dodgers off the hook and punishing the rest of us for a recession we did not cause.’
‘HMRC is disappointed with the decision to strike and will do everything it can to maintain services to the public,’ the department said in a statement.
‘We are seeking dialogue with the PCS to address their concerns and will work to minimise any disruption to our customers. In our 2010 spending review the Government made £917m available to us to tackle avoidance, evasion and fraud. This is being used to increase our tax take from compliance work by £7bn a year in 2014/15 which we are on target to do. Last year alone we increased the yield from our compliance work to £13.9bn.’
PCS said today’s action would be followed by ongoing industrial action short of a strike. Staff would refuse to do overtime ‘used to mask the effect of staffing cuts’.
