Clause 21
Finance (No. 2) Bill
4:00 pm
Julia Goldsworthy (Shadow Chief Secretary To the Treasury, Treasury; Falmouth and Camborne, Liberal Democrat)
Again, I stress that there are good intentions behind the clause, but I seek clarification on some areas. Does not existing legislation require record-keeping in all businesses? How does the clause extend HMRC’s powers? How does it meet the proportionality test of businesses? Does it ask companies to keep records not only on their own businesses, but, in some cases, on other businesses? Is it reasonable to ask them to do that? Of course it makes sense, when businesses are undergoing an appeal process, to have records to hand, but can the Minister confirm that the burden of proof will remain with HMRC rather than being shifted to businesses? Will there be a full right of appeal that will give the courts unfettered jurisdiction? Those are our key concerns about proportionality and record-keeping.
With respect to the penalty and the issue raised in proposed new section 69B(4) of the Value Added Tax Act 1994, what circumstances constitute changes to the value of the penalty? The paragraph mentions
“a change in the value of money”,
but how will the Treasury assess that? Will it be through simple indexation, or is it purely at the discretion of the Treasury to change the order of magnitude to whatever it considers appropriate? Those are the two key areas of concern that I would like the Minister to address.