Clause 6
Finance Bill
9:00 am
John Howell (Henley, Conservative)
That is a pertinent remark, and it is a pertinent conclusion to draw. In the morning sitting of the Treasury Committee, Mr. Williams, who is the director of personal tax and welfare reform at the Treasury, said that some modelling had taken place. There is therefore confusion about whether the modelling was scientific. Was the Chancellor criticising the modelling that had taken place, which he would have been aware had been described in a little detail in the earlier sitting? Did that modelling take place before he reached his decision on a 50 per cent. tax rate? Was that modelling to justify a decision that had already been taken, or was it modelling that was used to inform a decision before it was taken? We simply do not know the answer to that.
I should also like the Minister, in summing up, to comment on the points raised both by the IFS and the Institute of Chartered Accountants. The Committee would benefit from a much better explanation—perhaps an explanatory memorandum on modelling.