Duties of Customs

Wendy Morton Excerpts

Ways and Means resolution: House of Commons
Monday 20th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Fysh]

I do not accept that at all, but I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. We have a major opportunity to think about what tariffs are best for all of our economy, rather than always having to think about just the EU. This is a really big opportunity to shape many of our industries, when we have just had to cope with a one-size-fits-all solution for many years now.

Our ability to cope on day one is dependent on the measures in the Bill being effective. I have to thank my right hon. Friend the Minister for listening so intently when I have slightly harangued him about trying to ensure that we have enough resource and application on these detailed matters. It is absolutely right that leaving the European Union is a complex business; it is not something we can just assume will be fine. We really need to devote resource, time and application, and to get as much as we can out of the private sector advising and helping us, to make sure we have the necessary technological solutions as part of these processes.

[Wendy Morton (Aldridge-Brownhills) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the Bill is very much about preparing the way for when we leave the EU? When we talk about going forward with a global Britain, that is about seeking every opportunity we can to take our country forward.

[Mr Fysh]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, and I completely agree.

It is massively important that we look at the data systems, and I have talked a lot with Ministers about the customs declaration service that we are putting in place by January 2019. I have met industry representatives, and I have to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Charlie Elphicke) for organising some of those meetings in a very efficient fashion. They have been incredibly useful in bringing key civil servants and key stakeholders up to date with exactly what is required.

I do not think we need to reinvent the wheel. We do not need to go for full, all-singing, all-dancing, new solutions overnight; there are some practical steps we can take in the interim. We heard from one panel about a system called Intrastat, whereby economic flows around the European Union, based on actual transactions, are recorded. It was suggested that it is possible to, effectively, bolt the tracing of different liabilities on to that system, with the customs system operating in parallel with it.

What our partners in the EU, or in any other part of the world, want to know when goods are moving across one of their borders is what is in those consignments and whether they need to think about a tariff or take into account some other regulatory provision. It is massively important that we can talk to our counterparts on the other side. I implore Ministers to try to persuade the EU, even though so far it has been very reluctant, to allow member states’ national customs authorities to talk properly to us about what data interfaces are going to be required for what will probably be quite a lot of extra transactions and considerations that will have to be made. I certainly stand ready to help with my contacts, if I can, to enable some of those conversations to happen. Whether it is a ramped-up trade facilitation exercise—the “option 1” that the Minister described—or a partnership based on a new type of tracing of the way in which goods move around our economy and across our external borders and those of the EU, at the moment, we will need to make and record lots of declarations of one kind or another, and the other side will have to be confident that what we say is the status of these goods is in fact the case.

VAT processing has been the Cinderella of this conversation over the past few months. Everyone has been focused on the duty side, and not enough focus and attention has been given to the VAT side. The manner of the processing of VAT really makes a difference to very many businesses, and it is a major cash-flow issue for most businesses. If we want to stay open to ideas, as we do, with our EU friends and allies, and if we want to have good facilitation of cross-border trade, we need to address, for example, the ability of a vendor to attend a trade show and take a load of samples with them, because if there is a VAT issue, that could really be a problem. It is also a problem in the art world where very high-value objects are moving around. We need to think about that.

Finance Bill

Wendy Morton Excerpts

Tuesday 12th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mel Stride]

I believe that that is due to an element of convention, but I am happy to speak to the hon. Gentleman after the debate. We have already clamped down on those who generate such schemes, and we are clearly clamping down on those who use and seek to benefit from them. The third thing is that we will now be actively clamping down on those who enable those schemes through their advice along the way, and they will face penalties of up to the entire amount that they have charged for their services. That is just another example of this Government’s determination to leave absolutely no stone unturned when it comes to clamping down on tax avoidance, evasion and non-compliance.

[Wendy Morton (Aldridge-Brownhills) (Con)]

While the Opposition squeal about tax evasion, does my right hon. Friend agree that it is the Conservatives who have done more in government to tackle tax evasion than Labour did in 13 years?

[Mel Stride]

My hon. Friend is right. Some Opposition Members claimed in last week’s debate that HMRC does not have the resources to clamp down on tax evaders, but that is demonstrably untrue. First, we have provided £1.8 billion since 2010 for exactly that purpose. Secondly, as I have already said, we have brought in £160 billion since 2010 by clamping down on such activities. The truth is that we are succeeding.