Employment Bill [HL]

Like my probing stand part debate on Clause 10, this debate is to explore whether it is necessary to endow HMRC compliance officers with such extensive powers. As noble Lords know, the recent changes that saw Her Majesty’s Customs and Excise and the Inland Revenue formed into one organisation have led to a complex array of different powers for HMRC officers investigating different areas of their remit. The Commissioners for Revenue and Customs Act 2005 was right to ring-fence what powers HMRC inherited from its predecessors. However, it is noticeable that only three years later the Government are attempting to extend those powers into a new area. PACE powers, which are set out in the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984, are considerable. They were extended to HMRC’s fiscal functions by the Finance Act 2007. This small Bill extends them beyond that. I believe that this is the first time that such extensive powers of investigation and enforcement have been awarded to HMRC outside fiscal areas. Can the Minister confirm that when he responds? Do the Government have any plans for adding to this regime any other matters that HMRC currently enforces with a lighter touch? I am aware that these provisions have been widely welcomed by outside lobby groups, but in this House we have the privilege of being more immune to the pressures of short-term expediency than might be the case elsewhere. Such large increases in powers should not be passed without scrutiny and should certainly not be welcomed without a real body of evidence to show that the new powers are both necessary and proportionate. I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure the Committee that there is a very real need for this massive extension of investigative power and that this is not the start of an inexorable expansion of HMRC’s powers over more and more matters.