In Treasury minutes, the government disagreed with all nine conclusions of the Public Accounts Committee on HMRC tax collection in the PAC’s 34th annual report. The following points are particularly worth noting.
The PAC suggested that the government should be more explicit about the limitations of the measure of the tax gap and gather more intelligence about the tax lost through aggressive tax avoidance schemes. The government counter-argued that the limitations of the tax gap were set out in its annual tax gap publication and that the tax gap was informed by intelligence on avoidance schemes gathered by the government.
The PAC recommended that HMRC deals ‘robustly with individuals and companies who deliberately mislead it’. Again, the government insisted that it already does so by implementing a strategy which aims at changing behaviours and using criminal powers where necessary.
The PAC criticised the government for ‘massively’ over-estimating the tax to be collected from Swiss bank accounts and recommended that the government obtains more information from the Swiss authorities. The government confirmed that it is pressing the Swiss authorities to understand why receipts are lower than expected and that it is making full use of any information obtained under the UK/Swiss agreement.
The PAC suggested that the government should analyse information obtained from ‘customers’ in order to understand the reasons why small businesses still struggle with real time information (RTI). The government treated the recommendation as implemented as it has launched a package of support measures last December and research suggests that small businesses are finding RTI easy.
In relation to RTI, the PAC also mentioned the lack of full disaster recovery arrangements. Again, the government argued that the systems were already built with high degrees of resilience.
In Treasury minutes, the government disagreed with all nine conclusions of the Public Accounts Committee on HMRC tax collection in the PAC’s 34th annual report. The following points are particularly worth noting.
The PAC suggested that the government should be more explicit about the limitations of the measure of the tax gap and gather more intelligence about the tax lost through aggressive tax avoidance schemes. The government counter-argued that the limitations of the tax gap were set out in its annual tax gap publication and that the tax gap was informed by intelligence on avoidance schemes gathered by the government.
The PAC recommended that HMRC deals ‘robustly with individuals and companies who deliberately mislead it’. Again, the government insisted that it already does so by implementing a strategy which aims at changing behaviours and using criminal powers where necessary.
The PAC criticised the government for ‘massively’ over-estimating the tax to be collected from Swiss bank accounts and recommended that the government obtains more information from the Swiss authorities. The government confirmed that it is pressing the Swiss authorities to understand why receipts are lower than expected and that it is making full use of any information obtained under the UK/Swiss agreement.
The PAC suggested that the government should analyse information obtained from ‘customers’ in order to understand the reasons why small businesses still struggle with real time information (RTI). The government treated the recommendation as implemented as it has launched a package of support measures last December and research suggests that small businesses are finding RTI easy.
In relation to RTI, the PAC also mentioned the lack of full disaster recovery arrangements. Again, the government argued that the systems were already built with high degrees of resilience.
