Clause 20 - Supplies arising from prior grant of fee simple
Finance Bill
9:45 am
Mr John Healey (Economic Secretary, HM Treasury; Wentworth, Labour)
I have explained to the Committee that we took steps to block the avoidance scheme in the pre-Budget report. At that stage, we had recourse only to secondary legislation, which we laid. We estimate that the revenue at risk from future avoidance schemes is £165 million a year. Clause 20 puts the powers in primary legislation. That allows us to simplify them and to take away some of the burdens for non-avoidance, which we implemented because we had to use the second-best, but nevertheless immediate, instrument of secondary legislation. The
clause is a further demonstration of our commitment to tackling VAT avoidance in a well-targeted way.