Inquiry into avoidance and evasion
In the Guardian article, Mann said that he would be chairing a subcommittee inquiry over the next six months that will look into tax avoidance and evasion.
The aim is “to unpick the failures of policy and resourcing that have allowed the tax base to be undermined”, he said.
“We’ll be pressing government hard, too. Ministers need to account for the holes in the tax system. They also need to explain how the relationship with crown dependencies and overseas territories works, and how they can clamp down.
“I want to hear from the dependencies and territories themselves.”
Evidence sought
As part of the inquiry, the subcommittee has invited interested parties to submit evidence in response to five questions:
- To what extent has there been a shift in tax avoidance and offshore evasion since 2010? Have HMRC efforts to reduce avoidance and evasion been successful?
- Is HMRC adequately resourced and sufficiently skilled to identify, challenge and counteract existing and new avoidance schemes and ways of evading tax? What progress has it made since 2010 in promoting compliance in this area and preventing and responding to non-compliance?
- What types of avoidance and evasion have been stopped and where do threats to the UK tax base remain?
- What part do the UK’s crown dependencies and overseas territories play in the avoidance or evasion of tax? What more needs to be done to address their use in tax avoidance or tax evasion?
- How has the tax profession responded to concerns about its role in aiding tax avoidance and evasion? Where does it see the boundary between acceptable and unacceptable practice lie?
The deadline for written submissions is 31 May 2018.
