Clause 34 - Powers in relation to documents
Tax Credits Bill
3:30 pm
Mr James Clappison (Hertsmere, Conservative)
I hope that the hon. Lady will at least listen to my remarks before she responds, because we are trying to help the Government to investigate fraud and remove the self-imposed restrictions on the authorities' ability to investigate fraud.
The clause gives the Inland Revenue power to obtain evidence in cases of suspected tax fraud and refers to powers already conferred on the board by sections of the Taxes Management Act 1970. The amendment is designed to help the Government and to look at the operation of those powers and the type of cases that they cover.
The clause appears to draw a distinction between the conditions necessary for the use of the power to
require documents to be produced and the use of the power to enter, search and remove information from premises. There must be suspicion of tax credit fraud for the use of the power to require documents to be produced. However, suspicion of ''serious'' tax credit fraud is needed for the use of the power to enter, search and remove information from premises. The amendment relates to the word ''serious'' and the necessity for that hurdle to be surmounted before the power can be used.
The Paymaster General may say that entry on to premises is a more serious step than requiring documents to be produced, but I ask her to consider that all cases of tax credit fraud are serious enough to be dealt with by a sentence of imprisonment. We believe that to raise the threshold to ''serious'' will create many difficulties in practice for those who have to investigate this type of fraud, which as we have heard and as I believe the Paymaster General accepts, is open to collusion, involves complex considerations and many grey areas. It is therefore particularly important that the Inland Revenue has the power to enter, search and remove information from premises, if they are to carry out a thorough investigation of fraud and to prosecute in appropriate cases.