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One point one billion

January 9, 2013

The coalition government doesn’t like the additional income tax rate of 50% on people with incomes of more than £150,000 a year. It says that the previous government’s estimates of the yield were wrong and published a detailed paper reviewing the actual amounts raised, to support its argument that the rate should be reduced from April.

The detailed report is here and if you will be kind enough to turn to page 39 and look at table 5.3 you will see that the adjusted figure for yield in 2010/11 is £1.1 billion.

In other words, if I’m reading it right, the government says that the additional rate didn’t bring in the five or so billion that Labour had suggested, but it did bring in £1.1 billion.  The conclusion (paragraph 5.64 on page 45) agrees:

Although the estimates are subject to a wide range of uncertainty, they suggest that the underlying yield is much lower than originally forecast, possibly only raising £1 billion at most.

Now, there was some comment yesterday during the debate on the Welfare Uprating Bill, because the Impact Assessment hadn’t been published till a couple of hours before the debate, so the information in it couldn’t really be used to inform the discussion.

Let’s look at it now, shall we?  Here it is: and, oh look!  Here’s what it says about the yield (the amount of money the government will “save” by not uprating benefits to keep pace with inflation)

Overall, it is estimated that savings to the Government from up-rating certain benefits by 1 per cent rather than by the CPI inflation rate, will be around £1.1 bn in 2014/15 and £1.9bn in 2015/16 in cash terms.  The savings will continue into the future and gradually increase in cash terms.

Of course it’s not a straightforward comparison – if it were, would even this coalition think that spending £1.1 bn on tax breaks for those earning over £150k was so important they’d take £1.1bn off of people working in low paid jobs and earning tax credits to pay for it… would they?  The £1.1bn from the top rate tax is the adjusted estimated total yield from the tax and not the total estimated reduction in tax take due from reducing the rate.  But if you look here at the tax information and impact note for the rate change you’ll see that the government aren’t really sure what the effect of reducing the rate will be, which is of course entirely in tune with their argument that we aren’t really sure what the tax brings in in the first place.

The impact assessment, of course, is a tool of evidence-based policy-making, and on these documents the evidence looks a bit uncertain to me.  Is the argument made?  Time will tell.

But in cash terms, what we seem to be talking about is whether incentivising the 300,000 people who pay additional rate income tax by giving them a tax cut of five p in the pound for their income over 150k is more important – more useful to  society?  More likely to get the economy moving?  More just?  More fair?  More… civilised?  Than taking it from people on job seekers allowance because there are no jobs, or on working tax credit because the jobs that exist are low paid?  It seems to be a question of priorities rather than evidence.

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Guest Post: The Honest (White) Collar

January 7, 2013

This is a guest post by FTD the barrister and author behind the forthedefence.org blog.

With much fanfare this week Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs announced their top thirty two tax cheats of 2012. Reminiscent of ‘America’s Most Wanted’ the mug shots of these ‘tax cheats’ was shown on television, in the newspapers and has been widely publicised on the internet.

If you missed it: http://www.flickr.com/photos/hmrcgovuk/sets/72157632409515581

I don’t like it. I don’t like it because it’s crass and tabloid.

And, I don’t like it because I’m proved right.

In 2005, I was a law student and in the early part of the year the Inland Revenue was merged with HM Revenue & Customs to become HMRC. I remember writing a scathing essay about how the ‘co-op culture’ of the Inland Revenue was incompatible with the ‘cop culture’ of Customs.

Combine that with the prospect of staff being moved over to the Serious Organised Crime Agency on the horizon and it was all getting a little culturally confusing.

Traditionally…

England and Wales have had three ‘law enforcement’ agencies to deal with as individuals. The police, the revenue and customs.

Of those, the most ‘enforcement’ driven was customs. Customs for centuries have raised billions of £s for the treasury by enforcing the law with regard to import and export. They have very little protective function and a very high enforcement function.

If you ask the older wigs around Temple what Customs were like, they will tell you some stories. If you were against a dodgy customs officer then they put a bent copper in the shade.

Remember, the police are still tethered (although pulling) to a leash: policing by consent. British sensibilities would never allow a police force which was full enforcement orientated. Comparatively, Customs were set up with no such leash, they had a job, catch the rum smugglers etc, extract the duties owing.

Of course, not everyone tries to smuggle dodgy gin, or commits criminal offences – but, everyone does pay taxes. So, at the other end of the scale was the Inland Revenue. An enforcement agency to an extent, but an agency which tried to co-operate with the tax payer to obtain dues owing.

My fear was always that customs culture would overwhelm the co-operative culture of the Inland Revenue.

By example, prior to 2006, today’s advertised top taxcrims would have been dealt with by:

Operation Inertia – MTIC fraud (VAT) – would have been a Customs job.

Operation Hippolamp – Tobacco duty evasion –  would have been a Customs job.

Operation Recuprical – Tax fraud –  Inland Revenue (possibly police)

Operation Reinforce – Import duty evasion would have been a Customs job.

Operation Rust – Alcohol duty evasion – would have been a Customs job.

Operation Tulipbox – VAT fraud – would have been a Customs job.

Operation Snowbank – Duty evasion – would have been a Customs job.

Operation Tousle 95 – Tobacco duty evasion – would have been a Customs job.

Operation Hazel Lamp – Tobacco duty evasion – would have been a Customs job.

Operation Vara – Import duty evasion – would have been a Customs job.

… should have been a customs job.

Clearly this latest piece of HMRC PR is a customs job. And, combined with the eyes. yes, you’ve all seen the ‘undeclared income eyes’ on bill boards, the tube, the train on the sides of buses.

It would seem to me that customs culture has won out. Combat don’t co-operate. The days of Moira Stuart, the cartoon of the Revenue man in the bowler hat: tax doesn’t have to be taxing are gone.

Culturally

Why do I say it’s wrong? I don’t know the figures, whether enforcement or co-operation are better. But, what I do know is that a culture of enforcement rather than co-operation widens the caste of people who are to be potentially criminalised, not only is that crass, it’s wrong.

It’s all too us and them, the Government suspects everyone, suspects we’re all at the tax dodge. Forget the fact that most of you pay your taxes PAYE.

People are less likely to be open with HMRC if they think they are a suspect rather than a customer. Afterall, to coin a phrase which all coppers love to hate, ‘my taxes pay your wages mate.’

FTD

Visit forthedefence.org for more blog posts about criminal justice today in the UK.

 

Posted in Avoidance, HMRC, Regulation | 5 Comments »

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Post 101

January 2, 2013

I see that I made 100 posts to this blog in 2012 – a profound thank you to anyone who made it through all hundred with me, and welcome to the next 100!

So now, in the spirit of the season, here is my New Year’s Wish List for the tax changes I’d like to see in 2013 – does anyone know when the window for Budget Representations opens this year?  The Budget will be on March 20th and there’s usually a few weeks beforehand when you can send in your ideas.  Anyone with more or better ideas, please add them in comments.

1. Abolish tax relief for private schools 

Because, seriously, how can we possibly justify giving tax relief to Eton College with its hundred million of investments  when the state school of which I’m governor can’t afford to get the windows fixed in the classroom with the damp problem?

2. Employ 150 lawyers to litigate the HMRC backlog

As ARC proposes:

Additional legal resources, 150 trained lawyers and 50 legal assistants, to accelerate litigation of the Tribunal backlog and accelerate yield. Cost £35m. Projected yield £2000m.

which seems to me a no-brainer.

3. Abolish the concept of domicile and move to worldwide taxation on the US model

The US system starts by taxing all its citizens on the basis of their worldwide income.  But then it goes on to tax all the people who are resident in the US on their income generated within the US.  This seems to me to be eminently sensible and if you agree with me, please add it to your own Budget representation.

4. Stop messing with AIA (annual investment allowance) and set it at 100,000 permanently

Or, really, just pick a number and stick with it.  

5. Shift tax thresholds up

Because, come on, no-one on minimum wage should pay tax, and no-one on less than 60k is “higher paid”.  Seriously.

6. Remove the difference between revenue and capital tax rates

Or, in other words, cut out areas of manipulation and avoidance by making the tax rates for income tax, capital gains tax and corporation tax the same – with the same thresholds.

7. Show some backbone over employment and self-employment

This probably needs a longer post, but honestly you’re never going to get agreement on what constitutes a contract OF employment or a contract FOR employment.  So get together a Royal Commission to devise two standard contracts that cover tax, NI, H&S… and make it a simple binary.  Are you on a version of contract A (employment) or contract B (self employment).

8. Show some backbone on the mansion tax

The main argument against charging an annual tax on people with homes worth over £2m seems to be that it would need an expensive new revaluation of the entire domestic property market.  Erm… why?  Charge the tax on anything valued over £2m the last time they were valued, and on anything that changed hands for more than £2m since then.  There.  Job done.  You’re welcome.

9. Make your mind up whether people are individuals or family members

And hurry up about it, because having a tax system that works on an individual basis (unless you get tax credits or child benefit) and a credit that works on a family basis (because Universal Credit is coming) is a recipe for disaster.  And, hint, people are individuals.  The child benefit is for the child – the clue is in the name – so they should get it whether their parents earn fourpence or four million.  But it should, of course, be a criminal offence not to spend it ON the child.

10. Look up “insurance”

And, particularly, “National Insurance” – and then read this article about care for the elderly.  And then extract digit and get on with it.

Posted in Bit of politics | 3 Comments »

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In which I unleash my inner Sir Bufton Tufton

December 19, 2012

I find myself turning into Sir Bufton Tufton as I read TC02006, the tax case of a chap called Philip Procter who was appealing against a surcharge.  (I would include a link, but I can only find it on databases you have to pay to access, sorry.)  I mean, I know it’s a clear sign of middle age that you start thinking things have gone to hell in a handcart “since my day” but in this case I think I’m justified in a bit of red-faced splutter.

I should explain that, “in my day” I have been to the old-style Commissioners hearings and represented the old Inland Revenue, so I have some small experience of trying to put together the Departmental case from different people’s paperwork and making sure the facts were correct, the paperwork was in order, and the case hung together.

And I realize that it’s a very different department today – today’s HMRC isn’t location based like the old IR but based on vertical “silos” that have outposts all over the country, so a case file (if they still HAVE case files) is made up of bits and pieces from people all over the country who work in different areas of the business that might not ever have spoken to each other…

…but still.  That’s no excuse.

If I were still working in HMRC and read what Judge Guy Brannan had to say about the HMRC case I’d be wincing.  If I were still working in HMRC today and were involved in management of the appeals service I’d be horrified.  And if I were Mr Procter or his advisors I’d be sending a copy of the judgement to the Adjudicator’s office and asking for compensation.

There were factual errors in the HMRC case.  Judge Brennan says:

These errors, although involving relatively minor matters of dating, do not fill me with confidence in the reliability of the description of events contained in the Case History.

This seems to me to be judicial politeness for, um, “teller of tales, your trousers have combusted”

The very least you should be able to rely on from HMRC is that they give an accurate account of their actions, and in this case it seems they weren’t able to say who said what to whom and when.

Mr Proctor had a time to pay arrangement in place.  HMRC cancelled it, but apparently didn’t tell him.  And it seems when he rang them about the surcharge notices he was getting, he was assured on a couple of occasions that this was a mistake, the time to pay arrangement was still in place, and he should carry on paying under the arrangement.  The HMRC evidence was that he’d been told on “numerous occasions” that the arrangement had been cancelled, but the judge wasn’t prepared to accept HMRC’s “evidence” and, from the facts as recounted, I can entirely see his point.  And it’s an extremely scary one, because – although anyone can make a mistake – you ought to be able to rely on HMRC to try its best not to make them, and to put them right when it finds it has.  Above all, when it does a case review prior to going to the Tribunal, it ought at least, at very least, to get someone competent and outside of the initial clusterfuck to read over the file and see if the case stands up.  That’s the part that I can’t get over – not that the Department might have made a mistake or three, but that its “review” was, seemingly, such a dog’s breakfast.

There’s more, though: that’s not an isolated incident, it seems.  Taxation magazine have started an occasional series devoted to “obvious and avoidable mistakes by HMRC”.  There are really enough for a series?  They start with the case of someone issued a notice to make a self assessment return in January, who then made the return within a fortnight, but was charged a late return penalty for making the return on paper after the paper filing date!

This is mixing up two different things.  The normal date for making a self assessment return is October for paper, January for online – so, yes, if you need to make a return for 2011-12 you need to do it before the end of January online, and if you send in a paper return you’ll be charged £100 penalty, even if it’s not the end of January yet (and even if you’ve no tax to pay!)

But that’s only if you’ve been notified that you need to make a return.  If HMRC tells you now, or indeed in January, that you need to make a return, then the time limit is three months from when they tell you, whether you make the return on paper OR online.

Or in other words, either HMRC didn’t check the facts, or they didn’t understand their own legislation.

Still, stuff happens, right?  One is an accident, two is a trend… but three?  Three is problem.  Three would be a symptom of a department that’s been cut too far too fast, whose management has lost the plot and whose staff are demoralized and unsupported.  Shall we stick at two?  Let’s cross our fingers…

Posted in HMRC | 5 Comments »

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Consultation on consultation

December 12, 2012

As well as being publication date for the draft Finance Bill clauses for 2013, yesterday also saw the House of Lords Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee hearing on the government’s quiet announcement that they were abolishing the 12 week expectation for consultations.

Oliver Letwin gave evidence and I’m sorry to have to confess that I am sad enough that I was quite looking forward to watching the recording.  Indeed the http://www.parliament.uk website includes what purports to be a link to the recording, but it simply takes you to the front page of the parliament video and audio site.

So I rang them up, and a very helpful gentleman had a look for the footage for me, and then emailed back a few moments later to say

Thank you for your telephone call just now in relation to the House of Lords Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee of yesterday.

Unfortunately due to a recording failure it is not currently possible to put a recording of this hearing on the http://www.parliamentlive.tv website.

We are hopeful of being able to obtain an audio recording of this hearing within the next day or so, which we will be able to place online.

When it is available we will send you an email to notify you of the link.

I apologise for any inconvenience in relation to this.

All kudos to the administration, at least to this part of it.  When I asked if it was ok to reproduce the email here, I was told

Of course.  We are hopeful of being able to obtain the hearing within the next day so.  Also a transcript of hearings are available from the committee website within a few days.

So there we are.  Let’s await the audio recording and the transcript before developing our conspiracy theories about the failure of the video!  Anyway, I heard from the committee that my email to them was “received” but that whether it was accepted as evidence would be notified to me separately if the committee decided to accept it as such.  Since I haven’t heard anything, I presume it wasn’t accepted as evidence, although clearly this is some use of the word “evidence” that I’m not quite getting.  However apparently they received a LOT of submissions:

The Call for Evidence for the Committee’s inquiry into the Government’s policy on consultations has now closed.

The Committee received 550 submissions, including 477 emails from individuals who made submissions for the inquiry following an online campaign by the Institute of Employment Rights. The members of the Committee were informed of this in a note. They are grateful to the many members of the public who took time to give an indication of their views, and regret that it is not possible to acknowledge each submission.

so I’m guessing I should be grateful they actually acknowledged mine!

I concentrated on the idea that consultations could take place in as little as two weeks, and suggested they hadn’t got the digital infrastructure in place to do that yet.  First, before abolishing the twelve week limit, I suggested they needed to

  • set up a single website listing all open consultations
  • list consultations in order of closure date
  • push consultations via a dedicated twitter feed
  • push consultation closure reminders via a dedicated twitter feed
  • provide an RSS feed from the central consultation website
  • duplicate the open consultation list on a facebook page
  • use search engine optimisation tools to put consultations into other relevant hands

If you want to read the full text of what I sent to the committee, it’s here under the cut:  Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Consultation | Leave a Comment »

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Tax simplification and better regulation

December 11, 2012

Does the use of “better regulation” tools like consultation and impact assessment promote a simpler tax system? (And, yes, I know it all depends what you mean by “simpler”, thanks)

Well, the coalition has four objectives for the tax system – they’re written into the Coalition Programme for Government, no less.  They  say (at item 29, page 30)

The Government believes that the tax system needs to be reformed to make it more competitive, simpler, greener and fairer

So I did a “quick and dirty” analysis of OLD (the “overview of legislation in draft”) published today on the Treasury site – yes, I know it’s on HMRC’s too, but a helpful twitter correspondent pointed out that HMT had it earlier. (Oh, and while I’m here: hint to the Treasury.  When you compile the TIINs into one document, you could add numbers instead of bullet points, so that we didn’t have to manually count them to realise there are tax information and impact notes for eighty-four measures in it.  And a decent editor could have cut out quite a few extraneous blank pages.  And added page numbers that were actual consecutive numbers instead of “A267”.  Ahem.  Yes, well.)

I had a quick look at the “policy objective” field for each of the 84 TIINs and tabulated which ones say they are aimed towards making the tax system

  • more competitive
  • simpler
  • greener
  • fairer

and the results are:

 More Competitive   2
 Simpler  10
 Greener    1
 Fairer  20
 Other  53
and, yes, I’m well aware that this adds up to 86 rather than 84, but there were two measures which plainly said that their policy objectives were to be fairer AND more competitive, and simpler AND fairer.
Like I say, it’s only a “quick and dirty” analysis and if you go through and do it for yourself you might come up with a slightly different answer, depending on how much inference you’re willing to put in.  I resisted inferring policy objectives this time around and stuck to straightforward statements.
Why does this matter?
Well there are some obvious questions – the “greenest government ever” ™ can only manage to come up with ONE tax change aimed at being green?  (It’s page A115 by the way: capital allowances for business cars, and it’s fair to say that it’s one where I actually did have to infer that the “environmental objective of reducing overall CO2 emissions” was a green objective.  It makes a difference of a fair few millions in tax and thousands in administrative burden, but produces an unquantified “indirect impact” of reduced carbon emissions.)
A remarkable number of measures are in the “other” category because the policy makers don’t seem to have answered the basic question of “why are we doing this?” which, yes, I recall from being involved in designing the TIIN process, is actually one of the considerations they’re supposedly taking into account.
Look at page A267, for example. Why are we cancelling the fuel duty increases?  Because “This measure will ease the burden on motorists and businesses”.  OK then.  That isn’t one of the objectives the coalition set itself, but you could, I suppose, say it’s a legitimate policy objective (even if it is startlingly anti-green in context!)
But what about this, from page A171:
This measure will encourage UK bingo promoters to grow their business and expand their customer base by amending bingo duty legislation to modify the restrictions and allow UK bingo promoters to link with overseas operators to offer ‘combined’ games of bingo
Are you seriously telling me that encouraging UK bingo promoters to “grow their business” is a legitimate objective of tax policy?  Or, if it is, is it not part of the overall narrative of making the UK a more “competitive” tax system?
But look at page A75 and tell me where there is an actual policy objective and what it might be:

Policy objective

The measure ensures that the switching of assets in a trust settled by a non-UK domiciled individual to investments in OEICs and AUTs is exempt from IHT charges. It also ensures that no tax will have arisen on those trusts which held OEICs or AUTs when the changes introduced in 2003 came into force.

I’ll have a closer look over the next few days at the ten measures aimed at making the system “simpler” – again, watch this space.

 

Posted in Bit of politics, HMRC, HMT, Reference | Tagged | Leave a Comment »

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Next year’s finance bill

December 11, 2012

So. “Full details of the draft legislation and supporting documents will be available here on 11 December”

*Refreshes HMRC webpage*

*drums fingers*

Posted in Bit of politics | Leave a Comment »

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Watch this space

December 10, 2012

Further documents will be published on 11 December including draft clauses for Finance Bill 2013, Tax Information and Impact Notes and Responses to Consultation on Budget announcements.

From the autumn statement page on HMRC’s site   Which is good timing, because I have to give a ten minute presentation on my research proposal today so I don’t have time to look.

But, as Scarlett O’Hara always said, tomorrow is another day…

Posted in About me, HMRC | Leave a Comment »

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A no brainer.

December 6, 2012

“Anyone with a home worth over £1million now facing a visit from elite tax inspectors” Well, up to a point, Lord Copper!

Let’s have a look, shall we?

The announcement was of a further 100 staff for the “affluence unit”, the bit of HMRC that looks at the tax affairs of people with more than a million quid. As the Telegraph article says

The unit, comprising 200 investigators and technical specialists in six locations across the UK, focuses on people who are evading or avoiding tax.

And, looking for the official announcement that was the initial impetus for this non-story, I see that Danny Alexander announced the unit was expanding from 200 to 300 staff, and with a remit to look at people with £1 million rather than, as before, £2.5 million.

OK then.  So how many millionaires are there?  The Treasury press release estimates half a million but – going back to The Telegraph, where we started – that seems to be a pre-crash figure and their current estimate is 280,000.  I’m not saying I prefer the Telegraph’s figures to the Treasury’s, you understand!  But let’s be generous and take the lower figure.

So we have 300 HMRC staff looking into the tax affairs of 280,000 people.

280,000 divided by 300 is 933.333 according to my calculator.  So let’s round it down and say each of these HMRC staff deals with the tax affairs of 900 millionaires.  Yes, according to the Telegraph’s own figures each worker in the Affluent Unit will need to spread their investigative powers over 900 millionaires.  According to the Treasury’s, over perhaps twice that.  Where on earth will they find the time to go nosing around blameless individuals whose houses have just drifted up in value?  It’s scaremongering, forget about it.

What is more interesting is the announcement that HMRC will have more resources in the autumn statement.  It’s here, in line 32 of the policy decisions:


 £ million
 Head 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 2015-16 2016-17 2017-18
+
32 HMRC investment Spend -10 -80 -25 0 0 0

Ten million in the current year, eighty million next year, £25m in the final year of the coalition and then zilch.  Hmmm… David Gauke’s written ministerial statement on December 3rd clarified this a bit: the 100 staff for the affluent unit are in there, plus some warm words about transfer pricing and centres of excellence.  But the figures are a bit off:

 A further £77 million will be provided to HMRC in this spending review period to further expand its anti-avoidance and evasion activity focused on offshore evasion and avoidance by wealthy individuals and by multinationals.

Well, 10+80+25 = 115 in my book, so if HMRC are getting 115 million and using 77 million on anti-avoidance and evasion, what are they going to use the other  38 million on, do we think?  I’m sure it’s hidden in the small print somewhere but I haven’t come across it yet – anyone?  (maybe they’re upping the £42 they can spend on each business for RTI by another, erm, sixteen quid apiece?)

But look here, at the ARC union website.  Now, ARC stands for Association of Revenue and Customs senior staff and it’s the branch of the FDA which covers senior staff in HMRC, tax inspectors, lawyers, senior managers and a bunch of other professions, economists and the like.  And they have a paper, Reducing the UK Tax Gap – Proposals from ARC. (which isn’t exactly prominent on the site, but if you look at the entry for December 3rd you’ll find it in the “notes for editors” from a press release they apparently put out on 30th November, presumably by leaving it in the statutory locked filing cabinet in the basement office marked “beware of the leopard”!)

What interests me is the suggestion that you could put resources into HMRC’s legal services:

Additional legal resources, 150 trained lawyers and 50 legal assistants, to accelerate litigation of the Tribunal backlog and accelerate yield. Cost £35m. Projected yield £2000m

One of the things that worries me about the extra hundred staff for the affluent unit is, where are they going to come from?  Because trained tax professionals don’t actually grow on trees, and HMRC has always been rubbish at planning for the future and making sure it has enough trained tax professionals coming online to replace natural wastage from retirements and resignations.  You can’t just go out and hire a hundred trained tax professionals – largely because the accountancy profession, where you might find people with at least analogous skills – pays a damned sight more than HMRC.

But you could go out and recruit a hundred and fifty lawyers tomorrow.  Because lawyers train themselves, or at least pay for their own training, and there are supply and demand issues in the legal profession which there aren’t in tax at the moment.  So you couldn’t find 150 trained tax lawyers – they get shedloads more than HMRC tax lawyers, I’m told.  But you could get 150 criminal lawyers, trained litigators, and start taking some of the backlog of tribunal cases to tribunal as fast as the tribunal could accommodate them.

ARC think an investment of £35m could bring in two thousand million.  And HMRC seem to have £38m left over, so it’s a no brainer, surely?  Why on earth not?

Posted in Avoidance, Bit of politics, HMRC, HMT | Tagged , | 1 Comment »

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Evidently…

December 3, 2012

Hmm.  As I said last week, I replied to the House of Lords Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee’s Call for Evidence on the Government’s new approach to consultations and received an acknowledgement this morning.

At the bottom of the call for evidence, it says

Submissions become the property of the Committee which will decide whether to accept them as evidence. Evidence may be published by the Committee at any stage. It will normally appear on the Committee’s website and will be deposited in the Parliamentary Archives. Once you have received acknowledgement that your submission has been accepted as evidence, you may publicise or publish it yourself, but in doing so you must indicate that it was prepared for the Committee. If you publish your evidence separately, you should be aware that you will be legally responsible for its content.

Well I’m all about consultations being open and I was expecting to reproduce here what I had sent to the Committee, so I thought I’d better check.

I emailed back and said

Thank you for the acknowledgement, but is this a different category from being “accepted as evidence” please?  I’d like to publish it on my tax blog but the instructions on your website suggests to me there might be two categories into which a submission fits, “received” and “accepted as evidence”?  Or am I being over-sensitive?

Apparently not.

notification of receipt does not constitute acceptance as evidence, as that is the exclusive decision of the Committee

and

If your submission is accepted as evidence it will be listed as such in our eventual Report.

OK… I can see why they don’t simply bundle up everything they are sent and publish it regardless (if only because the temptation for someone to stage an “email fillibuster” by sending them 42 copies of, say, the complete works of Dickens) but, nevertheless, I think they’re using the word “evidence” to mean some category that I haven’t quite got my head around yet.

Anyone know anything more sensible about what they mean and why?  Otherwise, let’s compose ourselves in patience and… watch this space.

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