Schedule 2 - Penalties: supplementary
Tax Credits
9:30 am
Mr Paul Boateng (Financial Secretary, HM Treasury; Brent South, Labour)
The employer's size will undoubtedly have an impact on the size of the penalty: larger employers will tend to have more employees receiving working tax credit, so the maximum penalties that could be levied on a small employers would tend to be less. However, beyond that natural effect, size in isolation should not be used as a justification for employers failing to meet their obligations. As I have already sought to explain in regard to other amendments, we would expect the Revenue, or the commissioners, to have regard to the individual circumstances of the case when considering the imposition of a penalty, and those circumstances may well include the size of the enterprise and the resulting capacity issues.