I am glad that I am looking more youthful and Conservative this afternoon, Mr Deputy Speaker.
This is a very good Bill containing much that I agree with. The Minister has rightly pointed out that it does some important things, particularly on something close to my heart—the theatre industry in my own constituency—but also on technology, which is one of the big growth areas for the future prosperity of this country.
I want to talk about an ongoing concern of mine. The Minister will be aware of what I am about to say. Barely a fortnight ago, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs began writing to some 5.5 million taxpayers to confess that it had got things wrong. Errors in the pay-as-you-earn calculation had led the taxman to charge some 2 million fellow citizens too much tax and a further 3.5 million Britons had been assessed too leniently. That latter group now faces the prospect of several years of repayments. All this is in spite of expensive IT and personnel reforms that were meant to improve the system’s accuracy.
That news came at a time when the House was scrutinising this Finance Bill, which proposes bestowing ever more powers upon that organisation—in my view, an unjust reward for yet another year of error-strewn performance. Meanwhile, a consultation is now under way as to whether HMRC should be given direct access to UK citizens’ bank accounts so that it can claim from source any tax that it believes it is owed. I share the view of many people on the Government Benches who are concerned that this coalition Government are overseeing the transfer of very considerable powers to the state. I fear that a precedent will be set for a future Labour Government, which we all hope will not come any time soon. However, such a Government might well be minded to expand further the taxman’s remit.
Will the Minister reconsider the new accelerated payments regime that is proposed in the Bill—other Members have spoken on that in the past couple of days—about which I raised my own concerns at Second Reading? It is vital that the Treasury considers carefully the impact of granting such powers to an organisation that, I am afraid, has proven itself time and again to have incorrectly calculated tax on a grand scale.