Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mel Stride and Paul Williams

Tuesday 21st May 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mel Stride)]

Disguised remuneration is an aggressive and contrived form of tax avoidance that involves a loan, which there is never any intention of repaying, being routed via a low or no-tax jurisdiction and then back to the United Kingdom, to avoid income tax and national insurance. Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs takes a measured, proportionate and sympathetic approach to the collection of this tax, which has always been due.

[Dr Williams]

My constituent contacted me about this issue and said that he had no choice in how he was contracted to work on a BP Norway project. Why is he being pursued rather than BP Norway and the other companies, such as NRL, AML and ICS (Salary) Ltd, which all work together to undermine workers’ rights and minimise their own tax liabilities? What action have the Government taken against those agencies?

[Mel Stride]

I refute the suggestion that anybody is forced into making a tax-avoidance arrangement. If something looks too good to be true, it generally means that it is just that. Of the settlements to date, which have been worth more than £1 billion, some 85% have been from employers, not employees, and we are actively pursuing the promoters of these schemes in exactly the way in which the hon. Gentleman would wish.

HMRC Estate Transformation

Debate between Mel Stride and Paul Williams

Tuesday 29th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mel Stride]

The decision to have a Leeds office as opposed to a Bradford office has been rigorously looked at. It hinged on eight principles, some of which I set out in my response to the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman), who spoke for the Scottish National party. On my hon. Friend’s more general point about the economic impact, the House should celebrate the economic success that we have had; we have the highest level of employment and lowest unemployment since the mid-1970s, and it is this Government’s policies that are providing that.

[Dr Paul Williams (Stockton South) (Lab)]

Four hundred people work for HMRC in George Stephenson House in Stockton South. Many of them have built their lives as carers and parents around their work. Why does the Minister think that it is okay to ask them to travel for an hour and a half each way just to keep their jobs, when 97% of them say that that is unacceptable?

[Mel Stride]

I do not think that we are requiring all the employees at that location to travel in excess of an hour to fit in with the new arrangements. In my statement, I set out at length the various measures—I will not repeat them now—that we have taken to make sure that HMRC does the right thing.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mel Stride and Paul Williams

Tuesday 17th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dr Paul Williams (Stockton South) (Lab)]

11. What progress has been made on implementing the Building our Future programme.

[The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mel Stride)]

Progress has been excellent on the Building our Future programme. We have now secured locations for 12 of the 13 regional hubs and negotiations are continuing on the final site.

[Dr Williams]

The HMRC office in Stockton South is closing. Hundreds of staff are being offered jobs in Newcastle, which involves a three-hour minimum round trip that people say they cannot make, because their family lives are built around a job that they are proud of. Will the Minister please meet me given what we now know about the impact that the closure will have on Teesside and its people?

[Mel Stride]

The hon. Gentleman will know that all staff who may be affected will have face-to-face consultations with HMRC staff a year before any changes occur. Some 90% on average of those across the programme will be in a position of having left employment or retired, or finding it perfectly acceptable to move, in this case to Newcastle. I would be delighted to meet the hon. Gentleman to discuss the issue.

HMRC Closures

Debate between Mel Stride and Paul Williams

Thursday 2nd November 2017 Westminster Hall

[Dr Williams]

We do not doubt that an assessment has been made. We simply want to see for ourselves that objective assessment. Perhaps we can learn what our talents need to look like, so that we can meet future objective criteria.

[Mel Stride]

The hon. Gentleman has asked precisely the same question that the hon. Member for Bootle (Peter Dowd) asked, so I have already dealt with that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mel Stride]

That is the third time that basic question has been asked, and I am not going to give a different answer from the one I gave first. Perhaps I could make a little progress.

HMRC will move to new regional centres, which will serve each and every region and nation in the United Kingdom. The first of them opened in Croydon in July, and has been designed specifically to help staff work together and change the way HMRC operates. The building is modern and is located in the heart of the community; it is a modern, environmentally friendly workplace. The other centres will open over the coming four years and have been designed with the future needs of HMRC and the taxpayer in mind. In addition, HMRC will keep open a limited number of transitional sites, as I have suggested, for several years, to help retain key staff during the period of transition, as well as five specialist sites for work that cannot be done elsewhere, such as the site at Dover.

The locations of the regional centres were selected with a number of criteria in mind, such as cost and wider facilities for HMRC staff. They ensure that HMRC has a presence in every region of the UK. The programme will, as I have indicated, deliver savings for the taxpayer of about £300 million up to 2025, plus annual cash savings rising to more than £90 million by 2028. HMRC has structured support in place to help its staff during the move. For example, it will support staff in moving, by helping with additional travel costs for up to five years after the move. It is working with other Departments to identify opportunities for those unable to move to regional centres. The Department has already supported about 100 people into new roles in 2016-17 and 2017-18. However, we need to remember that the vast majority of HMRC employees are within reasonable daily travel distance from a regional centre, specialist site or transitional site. The locations of regional centres were chosen with the whereabouts of existing staff in mind.

[Dr Paul Williams]

The Minister said that the vast majority of people who will transfer are within reasonable distance of one of the new sites. Is there a definition of a reasonable distance, in terms of travel time?

[Mel Stride]

I shall get back to the hon. Gentleman on precisely what that means. I suspect it is a travel-to-work time, but it will probably vary depending on location.